Effect of church attendance during youth on future psychological capital endowments

There is a long line of research in the literature that establishes a significant positive relationship between the worker’s human capital endowment and his/her economic accomplishments in the form of higher earnings, increased productivity, better employment opportunities and greater occupational success. Accumulation of human capital, however, results from education and training, and consequently numerous studies by economists during the last several decades have recommended acquiring more schooling as an important means of gaining economic success. Recently, however, a new line of research has emphasized the role of psychological capital, such as self-esteem, motivation, positive attitude and self-satisfaction (contentment or happiness), in augmenting the worker’s productivity and earnings. These studies claim that the psychological capital characteristics, like standard human capital variables, affect the worker’s productivity and wage positively. Several other studies have further demonstrated that these psychological capital variables not only promote the workers’ economic accomplishments, but also augment their psychological satisfaction in life and at the workplace. For improving the worker’s economic and psychological performance, therefore, it is necessary to explore different ways of promoting workers’ psychological capital endowments. The current study provides one such strategy to achieve this important goal, and claims that, like formal education, which promotes human capital endowments, value education in the form of church attendance during earlier years in life may enhance the worker’s psychological capital endowments which in turn is likely to improve the individual’s earnings and happiness during adulthood. The current study tests this hypothesis.

The study examines the effects of church attendance on three psychological capital variables – self-esteem, positive attitude and self-satisfaction (contentment or happiness). Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1979 (NLSY79) and following a propensity score matching (PSM) approach, the study demonstrates that church attendance during earlier years of life has a significant positive effect on the individual’s self-esteem, positive attitude and happiness during his/her adulthood. This finding remains robust to changes in the variable specification and the worker's age, and thus has important policy implications. It suggests that, if psychological capital contributes positively to the improvement in economic and psychological performance, these improvements to a large extent can be brought about by promoting value education in the form of church attendance among youths and young adults. The study further examines extensively important directions for future research.