Costly behaviors transmit beliefs because they prove honest commitment

Evidence

A third reason why beliefs in supernatural watchers can be culturally contagious is when they are tied to extravagant behaviors that convince observers of the sincerity of the believer. … To avoid being duped, evolution has endowed cultural learners with a set of strategies that makes us pay attention to cues that a cultural model is actually committed to the beliefs he or she advertises. … One such strategy is for learners to pay attention to whether models engage in behaviors that would be costly if opposing beliefs were held. If so, learners can be more confident that the model actually holds the belief, and as a result they would be more likely to adopt the belief from the model. — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 130

Categorization

• XREF: The ‘evil teacher’ problem and costly honest signaling connects directly to the broader credible-commitment literature (Frank, Hirschleifer) and to the reader’s interest in why public fumi-e trampling reads as genuine apostasy rather than hollow conformity.
• QUESTION: This contrasts credible displays (for the speaker) with costly signals (for group cohesion) — how does a coerced public trampling, which is costly but NOT chosen, function under either mechanism?