Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Book cover

Advances in the Economics of Religion pp 61–72Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

When Average Is Irrelevant: Computational Modeling of Religious Groups

  • Chapter
  • First Online:

  • 1032 Accesses

Part of the book series: International Economic Association Series ((IEA))

Abstract

Consider a thought experiment. Two groups are competing for members in a small town religious market. Each of the groups, the Alphas and Omegas, count 100 members on its respective registry, but while the Alphas can boast 90 members in its pews every Sunday, the Omegas must demure to only having 60. Which group is more successful? Which receives more in yearly tithing? Which is more likely to still exist in 20 years?

I thank Charles North for useful comments and suggestions.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD   49.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD   159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    While computational models in the economic study of religion has been relatively sparse, there have been a handful of models constructed within other social scientific disciplines, including sociology, anthropology, and evolutionary biology (Bainbridge 1995, 2006; Doran 1998; Upal 2005; Chattoe 2006; Dow 2008). In fact, cognitive models of religious groups and theology, well still early stage theoretical contributions, are perhaps the first to computationally model beliefs, symbolism, and the structure of ritual (Whitehouse 2002; Whitehouse et al. 2012). In general, the consideration of beliefs in economic models of religion has been notably sparse (Montgomery 1996a, b).

  2. 2.

    The “corner solution” issue is accommodated in different manners in the club theory of religion literature. In his formal model of church and sect, Iannaccone (1988) assumes that the returns to personal religious conduct always have an interior maximum. Berman (2000), in point of contrast, simplifies the sacrifice to purely screening mechanism (omitting secular good-club, good substitution effects). Subsequent laboratory research found the sacrifice mechanism effective in a purely non-religious context, but also found the screening mechanism dominated (nontrivial) price effects (Aimone et al. 2013).

  3. 3.

    One of the themes in Krueger’s (2007) empirical investigation of terrorism is the insufficiency of average rates of education and income in trying to empirically predict terrorism rates and other national level outcomes.

References

  • Aimone, J.A., L.R. Iannaccone, M.D. Makowsky, and J. Rubin. 2013. Endogenous Group Formation and Unproductive Costs. Review of Economic Studies 80 (4): 1215–1236.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bainbridge, W.S. 1995. Neural Network Models of Religious Belief. Sociological Perspectives 38 (4): 483–495.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2006. God from the Machine: Artificial Intelligence Models of Religious Cognition. Rowman Altamira.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berman, E. 2000. Sect, Subsidy, and Sacrifice: An Economist’s View of Ultra-Orthodox Jews. Quarterly Journal of Economics 65 (3): 905–953.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chattoe, E. 2006. Using Simulation to Develop Testable Functionalist Explanations: A Case Study of Church Survival. The British Journal of Sociology 57 (3): 379–397.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Doran, J. 1998. Simulating Collective Misbelief. Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation 1 (1): 1–3.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dow, J. 2008. Is Religion an Evolutionary Adaptation? Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation 11 (2): 2.

    Google Scholar 

  • Finke, R., and R. Stark. 1992. The Churching of America, 1776–1990: Winners and Losers in Our Religious Economy. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Friedman, D., J. Fan, J. Gair, S. Iyer, B. Redlicki, and C. Velu. 2018. How Fundamentalism Takes Root: A Simulation Study. Working Paper No. 1681, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Iannaccone, L.R. 1988. A Formal Model of Church and Sect. American Journal of Sociology 94 (Supplement: Organizations and Institutions: Sociological and Economic Approaches to the Analysis of Social Structure): S241–S268.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1992. Sacrifice and Stigma: Reducing Free-Riding in Cults, Communes, and Other Collectives. Journal of Political Economy 100 (2): 271–291.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1997. Skewness Explained: A Rational Choice Model of Religious Giving. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 36 (2): 141–157.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Iannaccone, L., and E. Berman. 2006. Religious Extremism: The Good, the Bad, and the Deadly. Public Choice 128 (1–2): 109–129.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Iannaccone, L., and M. Makowsky. 2007. Accidental Atheists? Agent-Based Explanations for the Persistence of Religious Regionalism. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 46 (1): 1–19.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Iyer, S. 2016. The New Economics of Religion. Journal of Economic Literature 54 (2): 395–441.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krueger, A.B. 2007. What Makes a Terrorist: Economics and the Roots of Terrorism. Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Krusell, P., and Anthony A. Smith Jr. 1998. Income and Wealth Heterogeneity in the Macroeconomy. Journal of Political Economy 106 (5): 867–896.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kuran, T. 1987. Preference Falsification, Policy Continuity and Collective Conservatism. Economic Journal 97: 642–665.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Makowsky, M.D. 2011. A Theory of Liberal Churches. Mathematical Social Science 61 (1): 74–87.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2012. Emergent Extremism in a Multi-Agent Model of Religious Clubs. Economic Inquiry 50 (2): 327–347.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Makowsky, M.D., and J. Rubin. 2013. An Agent-Based Model of Centralized Institutions, Social Network Technology, and Revolution. PLoS One 8 (11): e80380.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McBride, M. 2007. Club Mormon: Free-Riders, Monitoring, and Exclusion in the LDS Church. Rationality and Society 19 (4): 395–424.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2015. Why Churches Need Free-Riders: Religious Capital Formation and Religious Group Survival. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics 58: 77–87.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Montgomery, J.D. 1996a. Contemplations on the Economic Approach to Religious Behavior. The American Economic Review 86 (2): 443–447.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1996b. The Dynamics of the Religious Economy: Exit, Voice, and Denominational Secularization. Rationality and Society 8 (1): 81–110.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rubin, J. 2014. Centralized Institutions and Cascades. Journal of Comparative Economics 42 (2): 340–357.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stark, R., W.S. Bainbridge, and The Seymour Martin Lipset Collection. 1985. The Future of Religion: Secularization, Revival, and Cult Formation. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Upal, M.A. 2005. Simulating the Emergence of New Religious Movements. Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation 8 (1).

    Google Scholar 

  • Whitehouse, H. 2002. Modes of Religiosity: Towards a Cognitive Explanation of the Sociopolitical Dynamics of Religion. Method & Theory in the Study of Religion 14 (3): 293–315.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Whitehouse, H., K. Kahn, M.E. Hochberg, and J.J. Bryson. 2012. The Role for Simulations in Theory Construction for the Social Sciences: Case Studies Concerning Divergent Modes of Religiosity. Religion, Brain & Behavior 2 (3): 182–201.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Winberry, T. 2018. A Toolbox for Solving and Estimating Heterogeneous Agent Macro Models. Quantitative Economics. Forthcoming.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. John E. Walker Department of Economics, Clemson University, Clemson, SC, USA

    Michael D. Makowsky

Authors
  1. Michael D. Makowsky
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michael D. Makowsky .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA, USA

    Jean-Paul Carvalho

  2. Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Sriya Iyer

  3. Chapman University, Orange, CA, USA

    Jared Rubin

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Makowsky, M.D. (2019). When Average Is Irrelevant: Computational Modeling of Religious Groups. In: Carvalho, JP., Iyer, S., Rubin, J. (eds) Advances in the Economics of Religion. International Economic Association Series. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98848-1_4

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98848-1_4

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-99336-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-98848-1

  • eBook Packages: Economics and FinanceEconomics and Finance (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation