23 Mar
2016
23 Mar
'16
1:34 p.m.
The CEU Department of Cognitive Science and the Social Mind Center
cordially invites you to its talk by
Michiel van Elk (Religion Cognition and Behavior Lab, University of
Amsterdam)
http://www.uva.nl/over-de-uva/organisatie/medewerkers/content/e/l/m.vanelk/…
Date: Wednesday, March 23, 2016 - 17:00-18:30
Host: Günther Knoblich
Location: Department of Cognitive Science, CEU, Oktober 6 street 7,
room 101.
Agency detection and supernatural beliefs
Evolutionary accounts of religion have proposed that an evolved bias to
over-detect the presence of other agents may be at the basis of belief
in supernatural agents. More recently, similar ideas have been proposed
in terms of the predictive coding framework, according to which prior
beliefs come to dominate bottom-up perceptual input. In this talk I will
present a series of studies scrutinizing the relation between
supernatural beliefs, perceived agency in the environment and feelings
of agency with respect to one’s actions. Although experimental
manipulations of supernatural beliefs and experiences (e.g. through
priming or placebo brain stimulation) did not affect agency detection,
the hypothesized relation between agency detection biases and
supernatural beliefs was tentatively supported by using an individual
difference approach (including a developmental study and field studies
with psychic believers). However, survey data (from large samples in the
US and the Netherlands) indicates that the relative contribution of
cognitive biases is only marginal with respect to the role of cultural
learning in sustaining supernatural beliefs.
We are looking forward to see you at the talk!
Cognitive Science Events at CEU: http://cognitivescience.ceu.hu/events
Social Mind Center Events at CEU: http://socialmind.ceu.edu/events
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