RLMgB601 Behavioral Measurements in the Study of Religion

Faculty of Arts
Autumn 2024
Extent and Intensity
1/1/0. 5 credit(s). Type of Completion: k (colloquium).
In-person direct teaching
Teacher(s)
Mgr. et Mgr. Radek Kundt, Ph.D. (lecturer)
Mgr. Jana Nenadalová, Ph.D. (lecturer)
Guaranteed by
Mgr. et Mgr. Radek Kundt, Ph.D.
Department for the Study of Religions – Faculty of Arts
Contact Person: Mgr. Kristýna Čižmářová
Supplier department: Department for the Study of Religions – Faculty of Arts
Timetable
each even Wednesday 14:00–15:40 K33
Prerequisites (in Czech)
TYP_STUDIA(MND)
Course Enrolment Limitations
The course is also offered to the students of the fields other than those the course is directly associated with.
The capacity limit for the course is 30 student(s).
Current registration and enrolment status: enrolled: 7/30, only registered: 0/30, only registered with preference (fields directly associated with the programme): 0/30
fields of study / plans the course is directly associated with
there are 6 fields of study the course is directly associated with, display
Course objectives
Does religion influence human behaviour? Does religiosity affect cheating, resource sharing, risk-taking, or adherence to and enforcement of group norms? How can we find out whether or not it does? This course will introduce basic behavioral science methods and focus on their application to the study of religion. Students will first be introduced to the basic assumptions of the behavioral sciences to understand why and under what conditions it is beneficial to step beyond the subjective accounts of informants or hypothetical scenarios of imagined behavior (e.g., impression management, identity-affirmation, memory failure, socially desirable reporting, etc.) when measuring behavior. After being introduced to a wide range of different behavioral measures, students will develop a deeper understanding of several basic types of economic games (dictator, RAG, common-pool resource game, trust game). The usage of economic games will be illustrated through research on Hindu, Christian and Jewish communities, contrasted with the Czech non-religious population. During the seminars, students will develop their own behavioral measures and modify the parameters of standardized measures to test the applicability of these measures in pilot studies. Special attention will be paid to the transferability of methods from the laboratory setting to the field and the adaptation of methods to the specific cultural context. In the critical evaluation of behavioural measurements, emphasis will be placed on verifying whether the measured concepts correspond to people's behaviour in the real world (e.g. trust in institutions, blood donation, compliance with traffic rules).
Learning outcomes
The course graduate will gain:
  • an overview of the basic tools of behavioural sciences and the conditions of their use in religious studies
  • the ability to critically evaluate the relationship between concept measurement, the concept, and the relationship of the concept to human behavior in the real world
  • sensitivity to the need to adapt the form of the tool to cultural contexts
    • Syllabus
    • Introductory lesson
    • Why to measure behaviour 1
    • Why to measure behaviour 2
    • How to measure behaviour 1 - Behavioural observation
    • How to Measure Behaviour 2 - Natural Experiment
    • How to Measure Behaviour 3 - Modifying the Real Environment
    • How to measure behaviour 4 - Laboratory and field experimental manipulations
    • Economic Games 1 - Resource Sharing
    • Economic Games 2 - Resource Sharing
    • Economic Games 3 - Norm Compliance
    • Economic Games 4 - Norm Compliance
    • Economic Games 5 - Trust
    • Economic Games 6 - Trust
    Literature
      recommended literature
    • Dimitris Xygalatas (2019). “How Do Religious Environments Affect Our Behavior?” In D. Jason Slone & William W. McCorkle Jr. (Eds). The Cognitive Science of Religion: A Methodological Introduction to Key Empirical Studies, 113-122.
    • Dimitris Xygalatas (2019). “Do Rituals Promote Social Cohesion?” In D. Jason Slone & William W. McCorkle Jr. (Eds). The Cognitive Science of Religion: A Methodological Introduction to Key Empirical Studies, 163-172.
    • John H. Shaver, Martin Lang, Jan Krátký, Eva Kundtová Klocová, Radek Kundt & Dimitris Xygalatas (2018). The Boundaries of Trust: Cross-Religious and Cross-Ethnic Field Experiments in Mauritius. Evolutionary Psychology, 1-15. doi:10.1177/1474704918817644
    • Richard Sosis (2019). “Do Religions Promote Cooperation? Testing Signaling Theories of Religion” In D. Jason Slone & William W. McCorkle Jr. (Eds). The Cognitive Science of Religion: A Methodological Introduction to Key Empirical Studies, 155-162.
    • Martin Lang, Panagiotis Mitkidis, Radek Kundt, Aaron Nichols, Lenka Krajčíková & Dimitris Xygalatas. (2016). Music As a Sacred Cue? Effects of Religious Music on Moral Behavior. Frontiers in Psychology 7(814), 1-13. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00814.
    • John H. Shaver, Thomas A.J. White, Patrick Vakaoti, & Martin Lang. (2021). A comparison of self-report, systematic observation and third-party judgments of church attendance in a rural Fijian Village. PLoS ONE, 16(10), e0257160.
    Teaching methods
    Lectures; seminars; home exercises; seminary papers
    The course combines lectures with discussions, for which students must be prepared by reading the required readings, and practical seminars, for which students must work on a task assigned during the previous lecture. At the end of the course, the student completes a seminar paper.
    Assessment methods
    The students' activity in discussions and the quality of the assigned micro-tasks are continuously evaluated. At the end of the course, students submit a seminar paper (in Czech, Slovak or English). Its main focus should be a description of the chosen behavioural measurement method, and the form should include a detailed description of the methodological section of the IMRAD article. It will be assessed primarily on the conciseness of the procedure but also on the justification of the appropriateness of the measurement for testing the hypothesis and linking the hypothesis to the research question.
    The seminar paper will be assessed with a maximum of 100 points. A score of at least 60 points is required to be awarded the colloquium.
    Language of instruction
    Czech
    Further comments (probably available only in Czech)
    Study Materials
    The course is taught once in two years.
    Information on course enrolment limitations: Zápis mimo religionistiku je podmíněn souhlasem vyučujících.
    Teacher's information
    The course is administered in ELF (an e-learning environment for the Faculty of Arts of Masaryk University).
    • Enrolment Statistics (recent)
    • Permalink: https://is.muni.cz/course/phil/autumn2024/RLMgB601