Found 870 Documents across 87 Pages (0.008 seconds)
  1. More 'altruistic' punishment in larger societiesMarlowe, Frank W. - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 2008 - 2 Hypotheses

    This article examines the relationship between population size (and complexity) and the level of third-party punishment in economic games. Results demonstrate that people in larger, more complex societies engage in significantly more third-party punishment than people in small-scale societies.

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  2. Moralistic gods, supernatural punishment and the expansion of human socialityPurzycki, Benjamin Grant - Nature, 2016 - 2 Hypotheses

    Does belief in moralizing and punitive gods promote sociality between coreligionists who are otherwise strangers? A recent dataset of behavioral economic experiment results and demographic and religious data among eight disparate populations allows the researchers to test their hypothesis of a positive association between deity's perceived interest in human morality and favorability of treatment of outsiders who share a religion. Their findings mostly support this hypothesis, which they suggest lends credibility to a theory in which religion encourages cooperation between large groups of people, and is thus a successful product of cultural evolution.

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  3. The Church, intensive kinship, and global psychological variationSchulz, Jonathan F. - Science, 2019 - 3 Hypotheses

    This article draws from anthropology, psychology, and history to gain insight into the causes of large-scale psychological variation among humans. The authors of this study are mainly concerned with the way that weak kinship structures induced by policies of the Western Church in Europe may have resulted in the modern "WEIRD" (an acronym for "Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic") psychological profiles in that same region. By correlating the amount of contact with the Western Church, rates of cross-cousin marriage (as an element of kin tightness), and degrees of individualism (as an element of WEIRD psychology), the authors are able to find support for this theory.

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  4. The cognitive and cultural foundations of moral behaviorPisor, Anne C. - Evolution and Human Behavior, 2018 - 2 Hypotheses

    In this two-part study, researchers first collect data from 600 people from 8 different societies in an effort to examine the character of morality cross-culturally. In the second part, participants play a game to detect honesty and responses are related to conception of morality and religious beliefs. Researchers posit that there is a cooperative nature to conception of morality and that moral culture is related to impact upon one's social life, but that this conceptualization of morality only weakly predicts cooperative behavio. The religious beliefs are stronger predictors.

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  5. Punishment and social organization: a study of durkheim's theory of penal evolutionSpitzer, Steven - Law & Society Review, 1975 - 5 Hypotheses

    This study empirically tests Durkheim’s theories of punishment in a sample of preindustrial societies. Analysis shows little support for five hypotheses derived from Durkheim’s theories. Findings indicate that in preindustrial societies, the intensity of punishment is associated with political integration, there are fewer collective definitions of crime, there is a higher likelihood of using material sanctions; additionally, slavery is likely to be an institutionalized means of punishment in societies with harsher sanctions.

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  6. Markets, religion, community size, and the evolution of fairness and punishmentHenrich, Joseph - Science, 2010 - 2 Hypotheses

    In order to explore the evolution of mutually beneficial transactions in large societies, this experimental study gathered data on the way people in societies of different subsistence types played games simulating interactions with anonymous others. The degree of fairness displayed by different players was correlated with measures of large-scale institutions, such as a market or world religion, that were present in a player’s society. Results suggest that “modern prosociality is not solely the product of an innate psychology, but also reflects norms and institutions that have emerged over the course of human history” (1480).

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  7. Murder and suicide in forty non-literate societiesPalmer, Stuart - Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology and Police Science, 1965 - 2 Hypotheses

    This paper tests assumptions regarding the inverse relationship between murder and suicide. Analysis suggests that murder and suicide in fact vary together, and they are also positively associated with overall punishment in a society.

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  8. "Economic man" in cross-cultural perspective: behavioral experiments in 15 small-scale societiesHenrich, Joseph - Behavior and Brain Sciences, 2005 - 3 Hypotheses

    This article presents the results of economic behavior experiments conducted on members of 15 small scale societies. Although three different economic experiments were conducted, findings focus on the results of the "Ultimatum Game." The authors found that no society adhered to behavior predicted by the "selfishness axiom" which suggests that individuals will behave in a way that maximizes their own gain. Authors also discuss possible predictors of behavioral variation within and between groups.

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  9. Differences between tight and loose cultures: a 33-nation studyGelfand, Michele J. - Science, 2011 - 5 Hypotheses

    This article explores differences between "tight" cultures ("have many strong norms and low tolerance of deviant behavior") and "loose" cultures ("have weak social norms and high tolerance of deviant behavior"). The tightness-looseness measure manifests in a myriad of macro and micro phenomena, from governance and religiosity to individual psychological processes. This study investigates these phenomena in modern nations rather than traditional societies. Potential ecological, historical, and socio-political predictors of tightness-looseness are also examined.

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  10. When Saying "Sorry" Isn't Enough: Is Some Suicidal Behavior a Costly Signal of Apology?Syme, Kristen L. - Human Nature, 2018 - 4 Hypotheses

    Researchers coded 473 texts from 53 cultures on suicidal behavior in the Probability Sample Files looking for evidence to support a new theoretical framework called the Costly Apology Model (signaling "I am genuinely remorseful for my actions, and you can trust that I will not do it again," (7)) to explain suicidal behavior that occurs after someone violates one or more social norms. This is theorized to be distinct behavior from the Bargaining Model (signaling "My fitness is genuinely being threatened, and I need your support." (7)) which could explain suicidal behavior after someone suffers harm from another, and from the Inclusive Fitness Model, where suicide occurs as a fitness behavior when an individual cannot reproduce or has a high cost to the fitness of their kin. .

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