Reminders of death temporarily spike belief in any available gods

Evidence

Experimental studies from psychology show that when existential worries intensify, religious inclinations increase. And conversely, when these worries are appeased, religious conviction wanes. In one series of experiments I did with Ian Hansen, we first reminded American and Canadian participants of their imminent mortality by asking participants to write about their own death in vivid detail, or in another study, read a graphic story about a child victim of a car accident who later dies in the hospital. Participants in the control conditions wrote about aversive topics unrelated to death (for example, dental pain), or read the same story with the child surviving the car crash. Then, under the guise of a different task that asked people about their opinions regarding a newspaper article about supernatural events, we asked them to tell us how strongly they believed in God. We found that death awareness caused a temporary spike in belief in God. When reminded of death, Christians were more devoted to their Christian God, but they also became a little more enamored by, and a little less suspicious of, even alien gods such as Buddha and Shamanic spirits. There is a truth to the old saying that “when in a storm, voyagers pray to any God.” — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 615

Categorization

• XREF: Directly applicable to the reader’s analytical frame: the Japanese authorities exploiting mortality threat (gruesome executions) to intensify, not weaken, religious seeking. — connects to: Death reminders uniquely trigger worldview and relationship defense, unlike other aversive threats. — Jeff Greenberg and Spee Kosloff, Terror Management Theory: Implications…, 19