title: Divorcing the puzzles: When group identities foster in-group cooperation.
abstract: We argue that general social psychological mechanisms (e.g., common group identity) can account for prosocial behavior and cooperative norms without the need for punishing Big Gods. Moreover, prosocial religions often do not prevent conflict within their religious groups. Hence, we doubt whether Big Gods and prosocial religions are more effective than alternative identities in enhancing high-level cooperation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Social Psychology,Friedrich Schiller University,07743 Jena,Germany.daniel.seewald@uni-jena.destefanie.hechler@uni-jena.dethomas.kessler@uni-jena.dehttp://www.sozialpsychologie.uni-jena.de/?lang=en.
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Seewald
authors.affiliation: Department of Social Psychology,Friedrich Schiller University,07743 Jena,Germany.daniel.seewald@uni-jena.destefanie.hechler@uni-jena.dethomas.kessler@uni-jena.dehttp://www.sozialpsychologie.uni-jena.de/?lang=en.
authors.forename: Stefanie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hechler
authors.affiliation: Department of Social Psychology,Friedrich Schiller University,07743 Jena,Germany.daniel.seewald@uni-jena.destefanie.hechler@uni-jena.dethomas.kessler@uni-jena.dehttp://www.sozialpsychologie.uni-jena.de/?lang=en.
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kessler
mesh_terms: D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D034462:Dissent and Disputes; D006126:Group Processes; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D012067:Religion