title: Religion replenishes self-control.
abstract: Researchers have proposed that the emergence of religion was a cultural adaptation necessary for promoting self-control. Self-control, in turn, may serve as a psychological pillar supporting a myriad of adaptive psychological and behavioral tendencies. If this proposal is true, then subtle reminders of religious concepts should result in higher levels of self-control. In a series of four experiments, we consistently found that when religious themes were made implicitly salient, people exercised greater self-control, which, in turn, augmented their ability to make decisions in a number of behavioral domains that are theoretically relevant to both major religions and humans' evolutionary success. Furthermore, when self-control resources were minimized, making it difficult for people to exercise restraint on future unrelated self-control tasks, we found that implicit reminders of religious concepts refueled people's ability to exercise self-control. Moreover, compared with morality- or death-related concepts, religion had a unique influence on self-control.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Queen’s University, 62 Arch St., Kingston, Ontario K7L 3N6, Canada. kevin.rounding@queensu.ca
authors.forename: Kevin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Rounding
authors.forename: Albert
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: Jill A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Jacobson
authors.forename: Li-Jun
authors.initials: LJ
authors.lastname: Ji
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000293:Adolescent; D004532:Ego; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008297:Male; D012067:Religion; D012069:Religion and Psychology