The neuroscience of religious thought
Where does religious thought come from? Researchers at Shirley Ryan AbilityLab in Chicago and San Diego’s Northcentral University are collaborating to research the “brain basis of religious thought” through a $6.3 million grant recently received from the John Templeton Foundation, according to a news release.
“Our goal is to better understand the faithful brain. We are scientists exploring how the brain represents important aspects of religious belief and actions, beliefs which have been and remain central to the human experience and affect so many aspects of daily behavior,” project leaders Jordan Grafman, director of brain injury research at Shirley Ryan AbilityLab, and Patrick McNamara, professor of psychology at NCU, said in an email.
“Religious practices may be as old as the first social communities. Our research will uncover important aspects of the evolution of the social brain,” the project leaders said.
The primary site will be at Shirley Ryan AbilityLab. Grafman’s team will use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology to evaluate 400 individuals’ brain network attachments to religion and God. Grafman, also a professor at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, said in an email that the individuals will be recruited from the Midwest, Boston and Israel beginning this summer.
Similarly, McNamara’s research team will be using neurophysiological headbands to collect data from 150 study participants to record their brainwaves while in REM sleep. Some of the participants from Grafman’s study might also participate in this study.
“Previous research suggested that some parts of religious cognition are rooted in the brain networks that also regulate REM sleep. So our use of these headbands will allow us to test that idea,” McNamara, one of the field’s founders, said in the email.
Additional subprojects funded by the grant will also focus on religious cognition.