Nonbelievers show mild trust toward believers while believers trust only their own

Evidence

Despite the American exception, as a rule, and with the usual caveat “all-else-being-equal,” strong secular institutions significantly dampen believers’ distrust of atheists. Nevertheless, cross-cultural studies such as this one, as insightful as they are, have one big weakness: they cannot tell us with certainty the causal direction of the effect. There is always the possibility that some other third variable that we did not think of causes societies to develop strong institutions and causes people who live in these societies to trust atheists. The gold standard for establishing causality is the experiment with random assignment and a control condition. In a series of such experiments led by Will Gervais, we wanted to know if mere reminders of secular authority would reduce distrust of atheists. — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 307 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Prosocial religious cohesion inherently requires excluding nonbelievers from trust; Priming thoughts of God makes believers favor their own religious group; Believers extend trust to outgroup members who hold any moralizing gods (+4 more)

Related

• Prosocial religious cohesion inherently requires excluding nonbelievers from trust (similarity 0.94)
• Atheists generally do not distrust religious believers (similarity 0.90)
• Strong secular institutions reduce believers’ need to distrust atheists (similarity 0.88)
• An unlikely mechanism reduces atheist distrust even among believers (similarity 0.88)
• Strong secular institutions substitute for and undermine belief in God (similarity 0.87)
• Religious belief strongly predicts distrust of atheists (similarity 0.86)
• Anti-atheist exclusion rises when trust matters critically in a role (similarity 0.85)
• Anti-atheist prejudice stems from trust concerns, not xenophobia or outgroup dislike (similarity 0.85)
• Religious cues harness situational power where secular institutions are absent (similarity 0.84)
• Distrust of atheists exceeds what warmth and competence stereotypes alone predict (similarity 0.84)
• Supernatural monitoring beliefs drive atheist distrust even without ingroup membership (similarity 0.83)
• Secular institutions, atheist prevalence, and religiosity decline reinforce each other in a self-amplifying loop (similarity 0.83)
• Cross-national correlations cannot establish causal direction for atheist distrust (similarity 0.82)
• Perceived accountability to supernatural monitors extends trust beyond one’s own religious community (similarity 0.82)
• Outgroup prevalence reduces distrust-based prejudice even as it raises fear-based prejudice (similarity 0.82)

Broader Connections

• Atheists generally do not distrust religious believers #corroborates (0.90)
• An unlikely mechanism reduces atheist distrust even among believers #corroborates (0.78)
• Supernatural monitoring beliefs drive atheist distrust even without ingroup membership #expands (0.75) — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 296
• Strong secular institutions reduce believers’ need to distrust atheists #complicates (0.75) — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 307