Population-level effects of education and material conditions on religious change in Chiapas, Mexico

Why do people adopt new and different religious beliefs and practices, especially when doing so is often costly? Economic approaches to religion highlight the role of material conditions on people’s religious affiliation. However, studies often rely on data that are not consistent with the level of analysis of their hypothesized mechanisms, risking the ecological fallacy. Many also infer material motivations to join a new religion from observed material outcomes, falling into the functionalist trap. Here, we present an econometric study of religious conversion by focusing on the relatively recent increase in non-Catholic Christianity in Chiapas, Mexico. This state has the most converts, as well as the poorest and least formally educated population in the country. This suggests formal education and material conditions influence religious conversion. To test this hypothesis, we analyze longitudinal data from the Mexican Population Census, spanning from 1950 to 2020, at the municipality level. To account for potential endogeneity between education or material conditions across waves, we implement a structural equation model for the analysis of longitudinal panel data. We fail to find a significant effect of material conditions or education (either positive or negative) on changes in religious affiliation in Chiapas. This may be due to the dampening effect of historical religious conflicts or differential exposure to Protestant missions, two variables omitted from our analysis for which no systematic data exists. It remains unclear if socioeconomic factors could still motivate conversions at the individual level.