Lonely people more likely to believe in God
Study: Those who feel isolated try to create social connections elsewhere
people who feel lonely are more likely to believe in the supernatural, whether that is God, angels or miracles, a new study finds.
Humans have evolved as social creatures, so loneliness cuts to the quick. Living in groups was critical to the survival and safety of our ancient ancestors, and "complete isolation or ostracism has been tantamount to a death sentence," said University of Chicago researcher Nicholas Epley, who led the study.
While group living isn't critical to survival in the modern world, feeling socially connected is. Feeling isolated and lonely is a very painful emotional state for people, Epley said, and can lead to ill health, both physically and mentally.
Being socially isolated is just not good for you," he said.
Seeking connections
When people feel lonely, they may try to rekindle old friendships, seek out new ones or, as Epley's study suggests, they may create social connections by anthropomorphizing nearby gadgets, such as computers or cars, pets, or by believing in supernatural events or religious figures.
In their study, detailed in the February issue of the journal Psychological Science, Epley's team tried to induce feelings of loneliness in people to see how it affected how they thought of pets and their belief in religious figures.
In one experiment, college undergraduates were shown movie clips and told to try and empathize with the protagonist as best they could, in order to set them in one of three emotional states.
One group was shown a clip from "Cast Away," the movie in which the main character played by Tom Hanks is deserted on a remote island, in order to induce a feeling of isolation. The second group was shown a clip from the crime thriller "The Silence of the Lambs" to promote a sense of fear. A third, control group was shown a clip from the sports comedy feature film "Major League."
All three groups were then asked to describe a pet they owned or knew well and pick three traits from a list that best described them. The list included anthropomorphic traits that related to social connections (thoughtful, sympathetic) and simple behavioral descriptions (aggressive, energetic, fearful).
Believing in the supernatural
Participants from the loneliness group were more likely to describe the pet using the anthropomorphic descriptions than those in the fear or control groups.
All three groups were also asked to rate their belief in ghosts, angels, the devil, miracles, curses, and God, and again, those in the loneliness group reported stronger belief in these supernatural agents.
In another part of their study, Epley and his colleagues asked participants from the University of Chicago to fill out a personality questionnaire and were then told that the answers would be fed to a computer which would generate a future-life prediction for them. Half of the participants were read statements implying they would be lonely later in life, while the other half were told they would be socially connected for the rest of their lives.
"We tried to manipulate their loneliness, to make them feel lonely," Epley said.
The participants were then asked to rate their belief in the same supernatural agents in the other study, and those in the "lonely group" reported stronger belief than those in the "connected group." The results were also compared to ratings the participants gave before they got their life predictions, and those who reported a belief in God before and were made to feel lonely reported a stronger belief after the experiment.
"We found that inducing people to feel lonely made them more religious essentially," Epley told LiveScience, though he notes it won't cause any sudden conversions.
Owning pets and religious beliefs and practices are both known to increase a person's sense of well-being, but why exactly that is isn't well known, Epley said.
Epley and his colleagues plan to probe the issue further to see if anthropomorphizing pets or believing in anthropomorphized supernatural agents is what is responsible for alleviating feelings of loneliness. If it is, it could provide alternate means for people to feel socially connected when connecting to humans isn't an option.
"There are health benefits that come from being connected to other people, and those same benefits seem to come from connection with pets and with religious agents, too," Epley said.
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Supernatural
The term supernatural (Latin: super "above" + natura "nature") pertains to entities, events or powers regarded as beyond nature, in that they cannot be explained by the laws of the natural world. Religious miracles are typical of such "supernatural" claims, as are spells and curses, divination, the belief that there is an afterlife for the dead, and innumerable others. Supernatural themes are often associated with magical and occult ideas.
Controversy
Adherents of supernatural beliefs hold that such occurrences exist just as surely as does the natural world, whereas opponents argue that there are natural, physical explanations for all such occurrences, summed up as
" Measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so." "
- Galileo Galilei
" If we subject everything to reason, our religion will have nothing mysterious or supernatural in it. If we violate the principles of reason, our religion will be absurd and ridiculous." "
- Blaise Pascal
According to the strict materialist view, if something "supernatural" exists, it is by definition not supernatural. Are there forces beyond the natural forces studied by physics? Are there ways of sensing that go beyond our biological senses and instruments? Certainly there may always be things outside of the realm of human understanding, as of yet unconfirmed and dubious in existence, and some might term these "supernatural".
Argument and controversy has surrounded the issue on both sides. One complicating factor is that there is no exact definition of what "natural" is, and what the limits of naturalism might be. Concepts in the supernatural domain are closely related to concepts in religious spirituality and metaphysics or spiritualism. The term "supernatural" is often used interchangeably with paranormal or preternatural - the latter typically limited to an adjective for describing abilities which appear to exceed the bounds of possibility. See the nature of God in Western theology, anthropology of religion, and Biblical cosmology. Likewise, legendary characters such as vampires, poltergeists and leprechauns would be considered supernatural.
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