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Switch to: References
Citations of:
Paranormal beliefs, education, and thinking styles
Personality and Individual Differences 39 (7):1227-1236 (2005)
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An analytic cognitive style denotes a propensity to set aside highly salient intuitions when engaging in problem solving. We assess the hypothesis that an analytic cognitive style is associated with a history of questioning, altering, and rejecting supernatural claims, both religious and paranormal. In two studies, we examined associations of God beliefs, religious engagement, conventional religious beliefs and paranormal beliefs with performance measures of cognitive ability and analytic cognitive style. An analytic cognitive style negatively predicted both religious and paranormal beliefs (...) |
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In this study, we explore the relation between scientific literacy and unwarranted beliefs. The results show heterogeneous interactions between six constructs: conspiracy theories poorly interact with scientific literacy; there are major differences between attitudinal and practical dimensions of critical thinking; paranormal and pseudoscientific beliefs show similar associations ; and, only scientific knowledge interacts with other predictor of unwarranted beliefs, such as ontological confusions. These results reveal a limited impact: science educators must take into account the complex interactions between the dimensions (...) |
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Cognitive scientists have revealed systematic errors in human reasoning. There is disagreement about what these errors indicate about human rationality, but one upshot seems clear: human reasoning does not seem to fit traditional views of human rationality. This concern about rationality has made its way through various fields and has recently caught the attention of philosophers. The concern is that if philosophers are prone to systematic errors in reasoning, then the integrity of philosophy would be threatened. In this paper, I (...) |
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Recent studies claim that having an analytical cognitive style is correlated with reduced religiosity in western populations. However, in cultural contexts where social norms constrain behavior, such cognitive characteristics may have reduced influence on behaviors and beliefs. We labeled this the ‘constraining environments hypothesis.’ In a sample of 246 Muslims in Turkey, the hypothesis was supported for gender. Females face social pressure to be religious. Unlike their male counterparts, they were more religious, less analytical, and their analytical scores were uncorrelated (...) |
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This study investigates the individual outcomes of irrational thinking, including belief in the paranormal and non-scientific thinking. These modes of thinking are identified through factor analysis of eleven questions asked in a large-scale survey conducted in Japan in 2008. Income and happiness are used as measures of individual performance. We propose two hypotheses. Previous studies in finance lead us to consider Hypothesis 1 that both higher belief in the paranormal and non-scientific thinking are associated with lower income. Literature on the (...) |
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Paranormal beliefs (PBs), such as the belief in the soul, or in extrasensory perception, are common in the general population. While there is information regarding what these beliefs correlate with (e.g., cognitive biases, personality styles), there is little information regarding the causal direction between these beliefs and their correlates. To investigate the formation of beliefs, we use an experimental design, in which PBs and belief-associated cognitive biases are assessed before and after a central event: a magic performance (see also Mohr (...) |
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Critical thinking skills are often assessed via student beliefs in non-scientific ways of thinking,. Courses aimed at reducing such beliefs have been studied in the STEM fields with the most successful focusing on skeptical thinking. However, critical thinking is not unique to the sciences; it is crucial in the humanities and to historical thinking and analysis. We investigated the effects of a history course on epistemically unwarranted beliefs in two class sections. Beliefs were measured pre- and post-semester. Beliefs declined for (...) |
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We provide evidence that religious skeptics, as compared to believers, are both more reflective and effective in logical reasoning tasks. While recent studies have reported a negative association between an analytic cognitive style and religiosity, they focused exclusively on accuracy, making it difficult to specify potential underlying cognitive mechanisms. The present study extends the previous research by assessing both performance and response times on quintessential logical reasoning problems. Those reporting more religious skepticism made fewer reasoning errors than did believers. This (...) |
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In this paper we investigate ignorance in relation to our capacity to justify our beliefs. To achieve this aim we specifically address scientific misconceptions, i.e. beliefs that are considered to be false in light of accepted scientific knowledge. The hypothesis we put forward is that misconceptions are not isolated false beliefs, but rather form part of a system of inferences—an explanation—which does not match current scientific theory. We further argue that, because misconceptions are embedded in a system, they cannot be (...) |
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A brief look at the empirical literature of the past ten years reveals the clear debate raging over the pertinence of paranormal study to the field of psychology. Each of the arguments put forward by sceptics and believers is the product of the epistemological context in which they find themselves. Each addresses a different issue, using different terminology and different scientific approaches. However, these studies do reveal certain personality traits among paranormal believers who use their paranormal beliefs to exercise mental (...) |
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Two qualitative projects have brought together non-directive and semi-directive interviews with 49 young people who had a paranormal experience between the ages of 11 and 18. A sequential analysis shows an emotional and cognitive pattern comprising four stages, accompanied by periods of anxiety. Young people move through those stages that correspond to a cognitive acceptance or rejection of what they are experiencing in order to maintain or re-establish paradigmatic stability. This study complements the many observations linking paranormal beliefs and anxiety, (...) |
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This study aimed to determine the levels of pre-service teachers' nature of science (NOS) knowledge, assess their pseudo-scientific beliefs, and examine the relationship between aspects of their NOS knowledge and these beliefs. It also aimed to determine whether NOS knowledge and pseudo-scientific beliefs depended on the discipline and gender. A survey method was conducted in this study. Data were collected from 215 pre-service teachers who are being educated in different fields in a state university. Two different five-point Likert scales were (...) |
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The aim of this study was to investigate relationships between the endorsement of beliefs in scientifically unaccepted phenomena and two psychological domains, namely proneness to aberrant salience and fundamental dimensions of human motivation. The project was undertaken as an online survey of 104 university students. “New Age” or paranormal beliefs were found to be related both to a proneness to aberrant salience and to a need for intimacy, but no such relationships were evident for traditional religious beliefs. The findings are (...) |
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