Supernatural Belief Is Not Modulated by Intuitive Thinking Style or Cognitive Inhibition
Miguel Farias, Valerie van Mulukom, Guy Kahane, Ute Kreplin, Anna Joyce, Pedro Soares, Lluis Oviedo, Mathilde Hernu, Karolina Rokita, Julian Savulescu & Riikka Möttönen
Scientific Reports 7, Article number: 15100 (2017)
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Cognitive controlHuman behaviour
Received: 24 April 2017 Accepted: 29 September 2017
Published online: 08 November 2017
Abstract
According to the Intuitive Belief Hypothesis, supernatural belief relies heavily on intuitive thinking—and decreases when analytic thinking is engaged. After pointing out various limitations in prior attempts to support this Intuitive Belief Hypothesis, we test it across three new studies using a variety of paradigms, ranging from a pilgrimage field study to a neurostimulation experiment. In all three studies, we found no relationship between intuitive or analytical thinking and supernatural belief. We conclude that it is premature to explain belief in gods as ‘intuitive’, and that other factors, such as socio-cultural upbringing, are likely to play a greater role in the emergence and maintenance of supernatural belief than cognitive style.
Acknowledgements
Supported by awards from the BIAL Foundation (62/06 and 380/14) to M.F., U.K., the John Templeton Foundation (57676) to M.F., R.M., G.K., J.S., and the Medical Research Council, UK (G1000566) to R.M. We thank Sangeetha Santhanam for her assistance with data collection for study 2.
Author information
Affiliations
Brain, Belief, & Behaviour Lab, Centre for Advances in Behavioural Science, Coventry University, Coventry, UK
Miguel Farias, Valerie van Mulukom & Anna Joyce
Philosophy Faculty, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
Guy Kahane & Julian Savulescu
Department of Psychology, Massey University, Palmerston, New Zealand
Ute Kreplin
Faculty of Social and Human Sciences, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal
Pedro Soares
Pontificia Universita Antonianum, Rome, Italy
Lluis Oviedo
Institute of Cognitive and Culture, Queen’s University, Belfast, Ireland
Mathilde Hernu
National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland
Karolina Rokita
Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
Riikka Möttönen
School of Psychology, The University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK
Contributions
M.F., R.M., and G.K. designed overall research. M.F., V.M., R.M., G.K., and J.S. wrote the first draft. Study 1: M.F. designed research; M.F., P.S., and L.O. performed research; M.F. and V.M. analysed data and wrote it up. Study 2: M.F. and R.M. designed and performed research; M.F. and V.M. analysed data and wrote it up. Study 3: M.F., R.M., and G.K. designed research; U.K., A.J., K.R., and M.H. performed research. V.M., U.K., A.J., R.M. and M.F. analysed data and wrote it up.
Competing Interests
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
Corresponding author
Correspondence to Miguel Farias.
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