Motivations for human behaviour : Relating attribution and expectancy inferences to socioeconomic and religious orientations among Ewe Christians in Ghana

Abstract: Since Max Weber's controversial thesis about the source of Western capitalism, social scientists have become embroiled in, and preoccupied with the central question of the function of ideology in human behaviour. In the process, other questions relating to this issue and especially that of religion came to attract the attention of many researchers. Such researchers focus their attention on the explanation of human behaviour in the sense of the motivating impetus for an individual's action. This line of research has been pursued in this study with the objective to explore the link between selected religious (Christian) doctrines and certain socioeconomic values and religious actions, particularly the engagement in religious rituals. A quantitative data analysis approach has been employed to reach conclusions on data collected from three Christian denominations in Ghana in 1995/96: Roman Catholic, Evangelical Presbyterian, and Seventh-Day Adventist Churches. The main emphasis has been on the use of Attribution and Expectancy theories of motivation and their role in human behaviour. Educational attainment appears to dictate respondents' socioeconomic values rather than religious beliefs (Attribution and Expectancy), while these beliefs have a measure of impact on the practical religiosity of respondents. It has been argued that while Attribution and Expectancy aspects of religious beliefs play a vital role individually in urgingbelievers to pursue a religious project, the influence of each should rather be seen as complementing the other as each separately is necessary but insufficient for religious involvement. On the other hand it is the Expectancy aspect that exerts more influence on believers' ritual practices than Attribution. On the whole the extent of a believer's religious involvement is a function of both inferential dimensions. These inferences have insignificant impact on the socioeconomic values of respondents in this study.