Religious belief only boosts prosociality where state institutions are weak

Evidence

The one possible exception where religious devotion—as long as it reflects sincere commitment to deep faith—matters, is in societies where strangers must interact with each other, but policing institutions are corrupt, weak, or largely absent. In study after study done in North America and Europe, where there is strong rule of law, there is little evidence that religiosity as a personality characteristic makes people act more prosocially. However, as discussed in chapter 3, the few studies conducted in countries with corrupt or weak institutions, such as India and Brazil, have found reliable effects of religiosity on prosocial behavior in economic games. — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 253

Categorization

• XREF: Directly feeds the analytical bridge: in Japan’s pre-modern setting of weak state policing of belief, religiosity signals would carry real behavioral weight — connecting to Norenzayan’s own Big God mechanism from earlier chapters.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 253