Cognitive Style Tends To Predict Religious Conviction

[rug]

By Rick Nauert PhD Senior News Editor
Reviewed by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on September 21, 2011

A new series of studies provide insights on why some people have stronger religious beliefs than others.

Harvard University researchers believe the answer is tied to an individual’s preferred cognitive style — that is, the way people think and solve problems.

In a series of studies, investigators found that people with a more intuitive thinking style tend to have stronger beliefs in God than those with a more reflective style. Intuitive thinking means going with one’s first instinct and reaching decisions quickly based on automatic cognitive processes.

As a contrast, reflective thinking involves the questioning of first instinct and consideration of other possibilities, thus allowing for counterintuitive decisions.

http://psychcentral.com/news/2011/09/21/cognitive-style-tends-to-predict-religious-conviction/29646.html

Link to research (costs twelve bucks):

http://psycnet.apa.org/index.cfm?fa=buy.optionToBuy&id=2011-21081-001

[valerief]

1. Stupid vs. not stupid. nt

[rug]

3. Stupid vs, not stupid.

"Importantly, researchers discovered the association between thinking styles and religious beliefs were not tied to the participants’ thinking ability or IQ."

[valerief]

5. Stupid researchers. nt

[rug]

6. Lol.

[Odin2005]

39. That makes no sense. If a person is not reflective they probably are not very smart.

[rug]

40. I think it has more to do with how information is filtered than intelligence.

[darkstar3]

2. The word is impulsive, not intuitive.

Other than that, the summary seems pretty spot on.

[rug]

4. No, the word is intuitive.

I suspect they know the difference.

[darkstar3]

7. Argument from authority.

"They" are researchers and so you assume that "they" know the difference. That is fallacious.

Of course, that's also a weak assumption, considering that the researchers didn't actually write the article.

As for intuitive vs. impulsive, they're talking about decision making. A person who makes decisions based on emotional response and without pondering the depth of possibilities is impulsive. Intuition is about perception, impulsivity is about decision-making.

[rug]

9. Appreciation of ability.

Or, I could just agree with you.

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[darkstar3]

10. Read #7.

And then do us all a favor and remove that slur.

[valerief]

11. What slur? nt

[darkstar3]

14. I believe referring to a fellow DUer as a "teabagger" is against the rules,

and I consider it a hateful slur when directed at someone simply because you disagree with them.

[valerief]

16. Really? The people with the bags on their hats introduced themselves to America as teabaggers.

Here's some history for you.
http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=9347732

Of course, the clip has been removed but the headline is still there.

Here's another.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLsKt4O4Yw8

[darkstar3]

17. And I don't give a fuck. It was offensive and you meant it so, as is clearly shown by context.

[valerief]

19. ??? What's your problem? You think teabaggers who call themselves teabaggers are offensive?

You think researchers who use the word "intuition" to mean direct perception of truth, fact, etc., independent of any reasoning process; immediate apprehension are "wrong"?

You want something to get angry about? Look at Congress.

[valerief]

12. I did. Write to dictionary.com. nt

[darkstar3]

13. So tell me how the definition you posted in any way pertains to decision-making.

Go read the various web definitions for intution and impulsive and tell me which one deals with action and which one deals with perception.

[valerief]

15. Intuition. The word used with intuitive. nt

[darkstar3]

18. Oh no, the adjective form, whatever shall I do?

"Intuitive" was a poor word choice. And if you really want to make a flamewar out of it with your "teabagger" shit, then you clearly have far more time to waste than I do.

[valerief]

20. My, my, my. The expletives are really flying now, aren't they? nt

[Ilsa]

21. Oh crap. I'm sorry. I'm reading on my iPhone

and I accidentally hit unrec. I don't Unrec threads except in very rare circumstances. I'm enjoying the thread, too.

[izquierdista]

22. Reflective = agnostic?

I knew I lived in a hall of mirrors. :think:

[Name removed]

23. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[valerief]

24. Agnosticism doesn't adequately address the issue of blind faith.

It assumes possible faith. However, faith is blind, not iffy.

[Jim__]

25. "... the association between thinking styles and religious beliefs were not tied to the ..."

"... participants’ thinking ability or IQ."

That's confusing to me. In the example given (and the others implied), the intuitive answer is wrong. Yet, it seems that this type of question could appear on an IQ test. That implies that either there are other types of questions on IQ tests where intuitive thinking is more reliable, or, maybe, intuitive thinkers answer more questions than more reasoned thinkers. If intuitive thinkers do better on some types of questions, I'd like to see an example of those types of questions.

Since both types of thinker are present in the population, it seems that each has its advantages; and a group containing both types of thinker may be superior to any group with only one type.

[valerief]

26. Or maybe most people react intuitively to some triggers and reflectively to other triggers.

Some people can seem totally reflective on a home remodeling project and seem totally intuitive on a political issue. Of course, more facts are available for home remodeling than the secret machinations that mold politics, so maybe in the political realm, it's the only way to reach judgment. Not the best way but a way. Of course, the need to reach a judgment is what's more interesting. Whatever happened to, "How would I know?" when you can't possibly reach an intelligent answer?

[Jim__]

27. The example problem that they gave, and their little analysis, makes me think there are some ...

... real-world advantages to intuitive thinking.

For example, one question stated: “A bat and a ball cost $1.10 in total. The bat costs $1 more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?”

The automatic or intuitive answer is 10 cents, but the correct answer is 5 cents. Participants who had more incorrect answers showed a greater reliance on intuition than reflection in their thinking style.

Participants who gave intuitive answers to all three problems were one and a half times as likely to report they were convinced of God’s existence as those who answered all of the questions correctly.

The intuitive answer was within 5% of the correct answer and, in some circumstances, could be reached considerably quicker than the reflective answer. In many survival problems, within 5% is good enough and quickness can be critical. I would think that a well-defined IQ test should capture that.

[valerief]

28. In your example, all the facts are provided to yield a correct answer.

What about when no facts are provided and yet the intuitive responder is "certain" of his answer? How good is that?

[Jim__]

29. Can you give an example of a problem with no facts?

In real world problems, I would associate each input with a fact. So, for instance, if a person is about to walk out the door and they hear an unexpected and unrecognizable loud noise, the noise is a fact and they have to decide what to do. Go back inside? Go outside and look around? I would guess that their "decision" can be either an automatic reaction to the noise, for instance ducking back inside, or, react based on what the noise sounds like from their previous experience, for instance gunfire; and if the noise is completely unrecognizable, I doubt they would be certain that their action is correct. But, I would expect that their reaction would be intuitive. If they reflected on what to do, they would most likely freeze where they were.

[valerief]

30. Religion.

[Jim__]

31. Your one word answer is not very clear.

Do you consider religion to be the problem? And, you believe there are not facts associated with religion? Or, do you consider religion to be a solution to a problem with no facts?

In either case, I don't believe you've identified a problem with no facts, but I'm not sure which case to address.

[valerief]

32. Well, I wasn't sure why you were changing to "a problem" in your post.

We were talking about belief with no facts.

My questions was

What about when no facts are provided and yet the intuitive responder is "certain" of his answer? How good is that?

[Jim__]

33. I'm sorry, but I still don't know what the intuitive responder is responding to.

Is she responding to a question? Can you give an example of the type of question?

[valerief]

34. See #26, I didn't frame the discussion around a problem with no facts.

You did.

See #28.

[rrneck]

36. I'm a former member of MENSA

and I still don't understand it. :rofl:


Every IQ test I ever took seemed to measure one's ability to free associate as much as anything else.

[dmallind]

35. An example shows the problem

OVERALL the difference between intuition and reflection may not be that one is superior to the other, but each is certainly best suited to a different kind of problem.

Early human development probably weeded out any purely reflective thinkers. When a huge predator leaps out of the grass nearby, the ones who stopped to wonder whether it may just be seeking a mate or running for the sheer joy of being free did not survive to pass on genes.

Intuition is best suited to this kind of problem - the ones where there is insufficient input to make an informed decision, and a need for immediate choice to be made with high risk.

But this article shows the failing of that approach, citing a real question from this survey
http://news.yahoo.com/belief-god-boils-down-gut-feeling-104403461.html

If A + B = $1.10 and A = B + $1, the intuitive thinker goes for A = $1 and B = $0.10. Here we have information, there is no need for immediate response, and nobody gets eaten if they are wrong. Intuition is precisely the wrong approach. Even a second or two of reflection would lead all but the most grievously mathematically challenged to the correct $1.05/ $0.05 answer.

The existence of gods is neither a sudden growl in the grass nor an elementary school math problem, but the approach to how to consider it is much closer to the latter. We have more information than we could hope to get through - entire libraries of holy texts, exegetical writings and theology volumes on one side and centuries of science textbooks with mountains of empirical data showing purely naturalistic explanations for things like speciation, geology and meteorology on the other. There is mo need for a split second decision, and even if you believe that a wrong decision is a grave risk of hell (although this begs the question as the risk is only real if you answer the original question in one way over the other) it's still something that allows plenty of time to understand and weigh the evidence and arguments.

As such intuitive thinkers may be more likely to believe in gods, and we all need intuitive and reflective decision making capabilities, but the intuitive approach is the wrong one to apply to the particular problem of ontology. It's an approach often used in real life, as both believers and non-believers have long decried the superficial at best examination of their beliefs that many theists apply, but it's still an approach that is inadequate and hopelessly misapplied to a question that's pretty important, well documented, and not at all urgent in the temporal sense. The more reflection is applied (if it is honest reflection rather than a search for confirmation bias), the less likely the acceptance of divine existence - as supported by this study.

[rrneck]

37. Intuitive thinking

is thinking "maybe".

Maybe that movement in the grass is a lion.

Maybe that girl wants to make zug zug with me.

Maybe E=mc2. (Damn phone)

Maybe if I treat you well you'll return the favor.

Maybe is hope. Hope is faith.

[Odin2005]

38. So stupid people are more religious? I could have told you that.