The Families of Theoretical Positions on Paranormal and Religious Beliefs (4):
- The Social Marginality
(Deprivation) Hypothesis:
• People believe that the things that they do (i.e. prayers) because it helps them cope with the fact that they’re a part of a socially marginalised group.
• For example, countries with higher rates of religiosity also have higher rates of infant mortality.
• Paranormal and Religious beliefs should be strongest amongst the socially and economically deprived.
• CCM- believing in an external omnipotent being (i.e. god) is used to help us cope with the disorder, injustice and hardships that one disproportionately faces as a part of a minority group – reduces anxiety and increased perceived control on the outcome of one’s life. - The Attitudinal or Worldview
Hypothesis:
• Some people more than others tend to take a more subjective (rather than objective), emotional and unscientific view of the world.
• For example, women tend to say they believe more in paranormal and religion than men do. Inadvertently reinforces gender stereotypes in which women are viewed as more emotional and intuitive than men and explains why women may be more open to paranormal or religious beliefs. - The Cognitive
Correlates/Deficits Hypothesis:
• Theory that those who believe in religion or the paranormal have some form of cognitive deficit.
• For example, not smart enough, illogical, dogmatic (black and white thinking), foolish or credulous but there is little evidence to support this theory.
• One study found some individuals are able to make connections between stimuli that others may not, this may make them more likely to believe in the paranormal or religious phenomenon. - Personality
Correlates/Psychodynamic
Hypothesis:
• We believe in paranormal/religious phenomenon because it serves a function, to meet our psychological need[s].
• For example, Compensatory Control Model (CCM) the idea that part of the reason why people believe in these types of things is that they give us a sense of control over the world around us.
• E.g. when personal control is low, we turn to external systems to increase our perceived control on the world (pattern perceptions, institutions or omnipotent beings) to gain a semblance of order in our world. Sufficient to have affirmations of order i.e. through belief in science and societal progression.
Is science about finding “proof”
It’s not about finding proof, it’s an intellectual discipline which is sometimes more about the journey of the scientific endeavour than the results we obtain.
What is the Scientific Method?
The systematic testing of our hypothesis/theories about the world, where we go out to collect systematic and objective evidence which we can use to test our theory/explanations in comparison to alternatives.
Important distinctions:
(A) Construct & Variables:
- A construct is an intangible concept that we have an intuitive sense of but cannot be directly measured (belief, love, ESP). Thus, we use operationalisations of those constructs into variables, so we have a tool/form of measurement that allows us to collect data about our construct. A variable can vary in its magnitude, high or low anxiety, strong or weak belief etc.
- Our ability to make generalisations from our variable to our construct relies on two things: reliability and validity of our measurements.
(B) Construct Validity &
Reliability:
- Construct Validity- that the variable we use measures what we intend it to measure. I.e. the beliefs scale actually measures beliefs or the Kessler scale measures psychological distress. Or IQ tests measures intelligence (poor construct validity).
- If the measurement tool has good construct validity, it will also be able to predict important outcomes or behaviours linked to the construct of intrust (i.e. academic performance, mental distress severity etc.).
- Reliability, the scale or measurement tool reliably produces consistent measures overtime and across people.
- Test-retest reliability (are measures consistent).
- Inter-rater reliability (are observers consistent).
The Tools of Science: Correlation
- Use a scatterplot
- Measures the extent to which two (or more) variables covary.
- We use statistics to remove the subjectivity from forming conclusions, and use these tools to determine if there is a meaningful difference between two groups, or statistically significant correlation between variables.
- The correlation coefficient tells us the size, direction and magnitude of the relationship between two variables. Can vary from -1 to +1 with 0 meaning null correlation.
Strengths of Correlations
- Correlation allows the researcher to investigate naturally occurring variables that maybe unethical or impractical to test experimentally. For example, it would be unethical to conduct an experiment on whether smoking causes lung cancer.
- Correlation allows the researcher to clearly and easily see if there is a relationship between variables. This can then be displayed in a graphical form.
Limitations of Correlations
- Correlation is not and cannot be taken to imply causation. Even if there is a very strong association between two variables we cannot assume that one causes the other.
- Correlation does not allow us to go beyond the data that is given.
Curvilinear Regression
- Relationships between variables are not always linear, sometimes a curvilinear relationship better describes how two variables covary.
- The figure shows, people who report having among the lowest levels of non-religious paranormal beliefs are also report the lowest levels of religious beliefs.
- The most religious people in the sample, also tend to report low levels of non-religious paranormal beliefs.
- Correlation coefficient for this graph is .63, a stronger positive correlation.
The Tools of Science: Experiments
*the gold standard of scientific research because you can make claims about causality
- Instead, we measured two groups of religious and non-religious paranormal beliefs.
- However, I manipulate what the two groups are told before they participate.
- This is an experiment.
- Group 1: reports more religious and non-religious paranormal beliefs than group 2.
- Less than 1 in 1000 (10%) chance that my results are due to chance.
- Control: improves our confidence that the results are due to the manipulation of the IV and we are measuring its effect on the DV. We want to control so we can rule out confounds and alternative explanations of our findings.
• The study of causality within psychology is referred to as…
(A) Attributions:
when we make inferences about the cause of behaviours or events in order to understand our experiences. These attributions have a large influence on our behaviour and how we interact with others.
Two dimensions of Attributions:
o Internal vs. External:
Is the event attributed to an internal, or dispositional factors such as personality, emotions or abilities.
Is the event attributed to external causes, or situational factors like the persons environment.
o Stable vs. Unstable:
Is the attributed cause a stable or unstable factor? Is it unchanging
factor or a temporary factor?
Locus of Control
People have a dispositional factor, locus of control, which makes people more likely to perceive and attribute causes as being internal, external or somewhere in between.
- Internal causes, such as dispositional factors are perceived to be controllable e.g. intelligence, hard work. More ambitious people who are success-orientated, politically active, middle aged that is detrimental in the sense that if we believe ourselves to be in control of our future and outcomes then we are also to blame for our failures.
- External causes, or situational factors which we have limited control over e.g. difficulty of task or luck. Belief that we have little control over the outcome or future. Sometimes to the extent to which you believe others control what you do and you just simply obey. For example, luck, chance, unpredictable, fate or others. People with an external locus of control tend to be fatalistic, more passive and accepting, less likely to have expectancy shifts, more common in younger or older people and are in the background because they feel they have no control over events.
locus of control is a ___ it may __ across contexts?
Is a spectrum of locus of control, your preference may vary across contexts.
Pros and Cons of Internal and External Locus of Control:
Pro:
- People with an internal locus of control are more likely to try and change the world to fit around me (i.e. study harder).
- External Locus of Control can be good for… situations in which we generally, have no control for i.e. accidents, natural disasters etc. Internal locus of control individuals struggle to accept things are outside of their control and take much longer to recover and are less happy than external locus of control individuals.
Con:
• External locus of control will not study hard because they believe their performance is outside of their control (fate, luck or others choices).
Terror Management Theory:
• How do we cope with the reality that death is certain and unavoidable?
• Humans are unique in the sense that we are aware of our own mortality and have a strong desire to live.
• Mortality salience causes intense feelings of anxiety that motivate us to engage in certain behaviours to buffer our anxiety about death and uncertainty around it.
e.g. avoiding thinking about death, developing cultural symbols of meaning and value to feel a sense of purpose in one’s life (symbolic or belief in life after death).
terror management theory and religious/paranormal beliefs:
- Those who took the death anxiety survey first were more likely to believe in religious and non-religious paranormal phenomenon.
- Levels of death anxiety were consistent across all conditions regardless on the order in which you took the survey. This tells us that death anxiety is more likely to cause or influence what people believe than beliefs influence their death anxiety.
An Evolutionary Theory of Religion:
*Baumards & Boyer’s (2013)
We engage in religion because we have evolved to do so.
human minds are motivated by evolution (dual-process model) to produce metarepresentation comments on our own intuitions.
What Constitutes as “Paranormal Belief” (PB)?
*Tobacyk and Milford (1983):
a. Unexplainable by current
science
b. To prove this phenomenon would require a major revision in the current principles of science
c. Incompatibility with normative perceptions, beliefs and expectations about reality
*problematic criteria- to have only a minority group believe in the “paranormal phenomenon” because it rules out religion which is argued to meet this criteria but would be excluded in countries/cultures where religion is a majority belief system.
*Tobacyk and Milford (1983) seven families of paranormal beliefs:
- Traditional Religion
- PSI (mindreading etc.)
- Witchcraft
- Superstition
- Spiritualism
- Extraordinary Lifeforms
- Precognition (tarot cards
etc. )
Faith Signatures, patterns in beliefs.
- Moderate Agnostics (MM)
- New Aged Spirituals (HH not
superstitions) - Religious Exclusives (HL)
- Undifferentiated Believers
(HH) - Undifferentiated Sceptics (LL
minor belief in extra-
terrestrial beings)
Highlights that religious and atheists are not good classifications for levels of religiosity and demonstrate that there are shades of grey. For example, New Age Spiritualists who are not necessarily traditionally religious but endorse but ideas about the soul etc.
Happiness, Trust and Anomie:
- Endorsing any kind of paranormal or religious belief you tend to be relatively happy, religious beliefs as the CCM states has a function to promote social bonding, ties and make people feel better about themselves.
- Levels of trusts are highest In religious exclusive groups.
percentage of people who believe in 1x conspiracy belief and percentage of people who believe more than 1:
20-30% and 5%.
Snowy Pictures (CCM)
High Personal Control vs. Low Personal Control conditions. Then asked to look at the snowy pictures (some with item others not) participants had to tell us if they saw anything in the static images.
Results: tell us that people in the low control condition had a predisposition to find patterns
in static images as an external system which aims to find order in our environment.
This is similar to the idea of “Apophenia” the tendency to perceive meaningful connections between unrelated things.
Climate Science: Lewandowsky et al.
One controversial paper proposed that one theory for why people did not believe in climate change or denied it existed was because they endorsed belief in conspiracy theories.
Evidence of climate change is supressed by people in positions of power and investment (oil drillers). Alternatively that climate change is being promoted by people who are invested in the environment and green energy.
SEM: Structural Equation Model-
a. Conspiracist ideation is -.55 on the acceptance of other sciences and -.21 on the acceptance of climate science.
b. Free market ideology -.40 on the acceptance of other sciences and -.77 with acceptance of climate science.
c. Previous environmental problems resolved is -.20 with acceptance of climate science.
d. Free market and problems resolved .50 correlation.
percentage of the population in NZ who are religious
• 20-30% of NZ’s are religious in comparison to US which is 70-80% religious.
relationship between belief in evolution and religious beliefs…
- IN NZ and elsewhere belief in the Big Bang and Evolution are negatively correlated with religious beliefs.
- Some countries show a positive correlation with religious beliefs and climate change but in NZ there was no relationship between religion and climate change.
The relationship between climate change and traditional beliefs is curvilinear.
Meaning that are the most and the least traditionally religious are the people who are the least likely to believe in climate change.
Moderately religious people are the most likely to believe in climate change.
Why?
a. High and low religious believers share a characteristic in common such as certainty which conflicts with concerns about climate change.
The Most Religious:
People who were exclusively traditionally religious or new age spirituals were equally as happy as one another. Suggesting that in terms of CCM their beliefs in phenomena unexplainable by science gives them a sense of personal control that helps them cope with the uncertainty of the world.
The Least Religious: Those who do not believe in anything (sceptics) were almost as happy, equally as trusting and relatively not anomic (dislocated from society).
*the most and the least religious are similar to one another. Marc’s research found that
people who are sceptics’ and don’t use spiritual beliefs as a form of compensation for
control are more likely to endorse scientific belief’s/theories. Thus, contemporary science
(evolution, climate change or big bang etc.) and can act as a CCM that gives us a sense of
order, structure in our lives.
**Science can act as its own compensatory control belief system in times of low personal
control.
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Module 1: Introduction to Psychology28
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Module 3: Abnormal37
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Module 5: Compensatory Control READINGS28
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Module 6: Emotion Regulation31
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module 5: lectures24
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Module 8: Impression Formation READINGS34
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Module 8: Impression Formation Lectures19
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Module 10: Love and Romantic Relationships21
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Module 10: Reading15
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Module 11: Psychopathic Personality LECTURES28
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Module 11: READINGS (3)11
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Module 11: READINGS (2)16
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Module 11: READINGS (1)18
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last minuet cue cards3
