Working across religions, cultures, settings, and development: Protocol for wave 2 data collection with children and parents by the developing belief network

The Developing Belief Network is a global research collaborative studying religious development in diverse social-cultural settings, with a focus on the intersection of cognitive mechanisms and cultural beliefs and practices in early and middle childhood. The current manuscript describes the study protocol for the network's second wave of data collection, which aims to further explore the development and diversity of religious cognition and behavior using a multi-time point approach. This protocol is designed to investigate three key research questions-how children represent and reason about religious and supernatural agents, how children represent and reason about religion as an aspect of social identity, and how religious and supernatural beliefs are transmitted within and between generations-via a set of eight tasks for children between the ages of 5 and 13 years and a survey completed by their parents/caregivers. This study is being conducted in 41 distinct cultural-religious settings, spanning 16 countries and 12 written languages. In this manuscript, we provide detailed descriptions of all elements of this study protocol, and give a brief overview of the ways in which this protocol has been adapted for use in diverse religious communities. As one example of how this protocol has been implemented outside of the United States, we present Arabic- and English-language study materials for children being raised in one of the following religious traditions in Lebanon: the Druze faith, Maronite Christianity, Orthodox Christianity, Shia Islam, or Sunni Islam. We end with reflections on the challenges of developing and implementing large-scale, multi-site, multi-time point studies of child development; our approach to navigating these challenges; and our suggestions for how future researchers might learn from our experiences and build on the work presented here.

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Journal
PLoS ONE
Published
2025-09-05
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0330727
Citations
1
Primary Topic
Child and Animal Learning Development
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
3.44

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article

Working across religions, cultures, settings, and development: Protocol for wave 2 data collection with children and parents by the developing belief network

John D. Coley, Emily Burdett, Megan G. Stutesman, Jenny Nissel et al.
1 citations
PLoS ONE
Child and Animal Learning Development
3.44
article

Working across religions, cultures, settings, and development: Protocol for wave 2 data collection with children and parents by the developing belief network

John D. Coley, Emily Burdett, Megan G. Stutesman, Jenny Nissel, Hea Jung Lee, Bolivar Reyes‐Jaquez, Natassa Kyriakopoulou, Patrick Tusiime, Allison J. Williams, Ayse Payir, Laura Shneidman, Pearl Han Li, Laura K. Taylor, Gil Diesendruck, Tamar Kushnir, Michael Gurven, Meltem Yucel, Peter C. Rockers, Aidan Feeney, Mervat N. Abdelhak, Jingyi Xu, Abby McLaughlin, Lezanie Coetzee, Tamer G. Amin, Florencia K. Anggoro, Shaun Nichols, Yue Yu, Ni-Na Ye, Xin Zhao, Cuiting Min, Ageliki Nicolopoulou, Mark Nielsen, Katherine McAuliffe, Audun Dahl, Amanda R. Tarullo, Irini Skopeliti, Emily Otali, Kara Weisman, Frankie T. K. Fong, Helen Davis, Benjamin D. Jee, A GARCIA, Jocelyn Dautel, Vongani Maluleke, Mahesh Srinivasan, Elizabeth L. Davis, Kirsten A Lesage, Hannah J. Kramer, Denise Evans, Maliki E. Ghossainy, Rebekah A. Richert, Eva E. Chen, Kathleen H. Corriveau, Julia Marshall, Jallene Jia En Chua, Jessa Stegall, Patricia Leshabana, Nthabiseng Masebe, Shitshembiso Lebepe, Esra Nur Turan-Küçük, Samantha Bangayan, Dandan Li, Ying Hu, Wei Zhang, Jiayue Sun, Ashley B. Marin, Caitlin McShane, J. Ruíz, J. M. Stephens, Sophie Riddick, Emily Chau, Adine DeLeon, Xuqing Foo, Isabela Gonzalez-Rubio, Elena Guerrero Galaz, Keila Huachorunto, Komang Indrawati, Michael Kahwa, Unity Kahwa, Ringking Korah, Jessica Tacza Llacua, Ghadir Soueidan, Anthea McMullan, Mike Mutegeki, Olive Namara, Katerina Parise, Xiomara Alicia Paucar, Sakina Poonawalla, Praveen Kenderla, Itangishatse Theogen, Desiree Toong, Estefany Pizarro Ventura, Rifah Sanjidah
article en
1 citations

Abstract

The Developing Belief Network is a global research collaborative studying religious development in diverse social-cultural settings, with a focus on the intersection of cognitive mechanisms and cultural beliefs and practices in early and middle childhood. The current manuscript describes the study protocol for the network's second wave of data collection, which aims to further explore the development and diversity of religious cognition and behavior using a multi-time point approach. This protocol is designed to investigate three key research questions-how children represent and reason about religious and supernatural agents, how children represent and reason about religion as an aspect of social identity, and how religious and supernatural beliefs are transmitted within and between generations-via a set of eight tasks for children between the ages of 5 and 13 years and a survey completed by their parents/caregivers. This study is being conducted in 41 distinct cultural-religious settings, spanning 16 countries and 12 written languages. In this manuscript, we provide detailed descriptions of all elements of this study protocol, and give a brief overview of the ways in which this protocol has been adapted for use in diverse religious communities. As one example of how this protocol has been implemented outside of the United States, we present Arabic- and English-language study materials for children being raised in one of the following religious traditions in Lebanon: the Druze faith, Maronite Christianity, Orthodox Christianity, Shia Islam, or Sunni Islam. We end with reflections on the challenges of developing and implementing large-scale, multi-site, multi-time point studies of child development; our approach to navigating these challenges; and our suggestions for how future researchers might learn from our experiences and build on the work presented here.

PLoS ONEVol. 20(9)
University College Dublin (IE), Boston College (US), University of California, Riverside (US), College of the Holy Cross (US), Boston University (US), Queen's University Belfast (GB), Udayana University (ID), Northeastern University (US), University of Wisconsin–Madison (US), Bar-Ilan University (IL), University of Nottingham (GB), University of California, Santa Barbara (US), University of New Hampshire (US), The University of Queensland (AU), Duke University (US), Nanyang Technological University (SG), University of Patras (GR), Union College (US), Lehigh University (US), Holy Spirit University of Kaslik (LB), University of the Witwatersrand (ZA), National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (GR), Cornell University (US), University of Exeter (GB), University of Johannesburg (ZA), National Tsing Hua University (TW), Brown University (US), Worcester State University (US), Victoria University of Wellington (NZ), FIT Consulting (Italy) (IT), Kibale Chimpanzee Project (UG), Wheelock College (US), Arizona State University (US), Pacific Lutheran University (US), East China Normal University (CN), Sunway University (MY), University of California, Berkeley (US), American University of Beirut (LB)
John Templeton Foundation, American University of Beirut, University of Pittsburgh, Queen's University Belfast, Victoria University of Wellington, University College Dublin, Monash University, Victoria University, Bar-Ilan University, Queen's University, National Tsing Hua University, Universität Konstanz
Openalex Percentile: Top 7%
Child and Animal Learning Development
3.44
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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