Foreword -- Introduction / Stuart A. Karabenick and Martin L. Maehr -- Metaphysical motivation: an expectancy-value perspective on why religious beliefs motivate / Martin Dowson -- Values, religion, and motivation / N.T. Feather -- Goals and regulations of religiosity: a motivational analysis / Bart Neyrinck, Willy Lens and Maarten Vansteenkiste -- Choosing to stay religious in a modern world: socialization and exploration processes leading to an integrated internalization of religion among Israeli Jewish youth / Avi Assor, Maya Cohen-Malayev, Avi Kaplan and David Friedman -- Personal religion and prosocial motivation / C. Daniel Batson, Stephanie L. Anderson and Elizabeth Collins -- Religious beliefs and their relationship to cognition, motivation, and behavior / Scott W. VanderStoep and Benjamin P. Norris -- Morality's conundrum: a question of motivation / Lawrence I. Rosenkoetter -- Personal investment theory: understanding religious, spiritual and faith development of students / Larry S. Braskamp and Mark J. Hager -- Religion, motivation, and schooling in East Asia and the United States / Akane Zusho -- An introduction to Hindu India's contemplative psychological perspective on motivation, self, and development / Robert W. Roeser -- The Asian Indian Hindu adolescent in America: religious identity and the need to belong / Revathy Kumar -- A psychological analysis of religious motivation with a focus on Islam and the Middle East / Farideh Salili -- Religious affiliation as a source of cultural differences in achievement motivation / Chu Kim-Prieto and Ed Diener
Considerable evidence indicates that religion is a motivational force in the lives of most of the world's population, and recent social and political events have placed religion center stage. Motivation is considered an essential component of any adequate answer to the question, "Why religion?" That question concerned early psychologists, such as Freud and James, but was relatively neglected with the ascendancy of behaviorism. It has since regained momentum as an important area of research and scholarship. In spite of the fact that motivational principles are implicit in many analytical treatm
