PMID- 32234502
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20210209
LR  - 20210209
IS  - 1873-6246 (Electronic)
IS  - 0301-0511 (Linking)
VI  - 153
DP  - 2020 May
TI  - Religiosity is associated with less prediction of the typical: An event-related 
      brain potential study.
PG  - 107884
LID - S0301-0511(20)30044-2 [pii]
LID - 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2020.107884 [doi]
AB  - Why are some people more religious than others? According to one hypothesis, 
      people who strongly seek definitive explanations for situations with incomplete 
      information are more likely to be religious. According to a different hypothesis, 
      individuals with smaller "prediction error" responses to unexpected stimuli are 
      more likely to discount evidence contradicting religious beliefs, predisposing 
      them to maintain such beliefs. We sought neurophysiological evidence for these 
      hypotheses using the N400 event-related potential (ERP), which is smaller to more 
      contextually expected stimuli, reflecting prediction of probable completions for 
      meaningful situations. We recorded ERPs from participants viewing category 
      definitions followed by high-typicality category exemplar (HTE), low-typicality 
      exemplar (LTE), or non-exemplar (NE) words. As expected, N400s were largest for 
      NEs, intermediate for LTEs, and smallest for HTEs. Religiosity correlated with 
      smaller N400 amplitude differences between HTEs and both LTEs and NEs. Less 
      strong prediction of probable stimuli based on prior information may predispose 
      to religiosity.
CI  - Copyright (c) 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
FAU - Kiang, Michael
AU  - Kiang M
AD  - Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, ON, Canada; Institute of Medical 
      Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada; Department of Psychiatry, 
      University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada. Electronic address: 
      michael.kiang@camh.ca.
FAU - Cupid, Justice
AU  - Cupid J
AD  - Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, ON, Canada; Department of 
      Psychology, Ryerson University, Toronto, ON, Canada.
FAU - Ahmed, Sarah
AU  - Ahmed S
AD  - Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, ON, Canada; Institute of Medical 
      Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
FAU - Lepock, Jennifer R
AU  - Lepock JR
AD  - Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, ON, Canada; Institute of Medical 
      Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
FAU - Girard, Todd A
AU  - Girard TA
AD  - Department of Psychology, Ryerson University, Toronto, ON, Canada.
LA  - eng
PT  - Journal Article
PT  - Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
DEP - 20200329
PL  - Netherlands
TA  - Biol Psychol
JT  - Biological psychology
JID - 0375566
SB  - IM
MH  - Adolescent
MH  - Adult
MH  - Brain/*physiology
MH  - Electroencephalography
MH  - *Evoked Potentials
MH  - Female
MH  - Humans
MH  - Male
MH  - *Religion
MH  - Religion and Psychology
MH  - Semantics
MH  - Young Adult
OTO - NOTNLM
OT  - Event-related potentials
OT  - Individual differences
OT  - Prediction
OT  - Psychology and religion
OT  - Religious beliefs
OT  - Semantic memory
COIS- Declaration of Competing Interest The authors report no conflicts of interest.
EDAT- 2020/04/03 06:00
MHDA- 2021/02/10 06:00
CRDT- 2020/04/03 06:00
PHST- 2019/11/28 00:00 [received]
PHST- 2020/03/04 00:00 [revised]
PHST- 2020/03/23 00:00 [accepted]
PHST- 2020/04/03 06:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2021/02/10 06:00 [medline]
PHST- 2020/04/03 06:00 [entrez]
AID - S0301-0511(20)30044-2 [pii]
AID - 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2020.107884 [doi]
PST - ppublish
SO  - Biol Psychol. 2020 May;153:107884. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2020.107884. Epub 
      2020 Mar 29.