Open AccessDirect replication of Gervais & Norenzayan (2012): No evidence that analytic thinking decreases religious belief
Author(s) -
Clinton Sanchez,
Brian A. Sundermeier,
Kenneth Gray,
Robert Calin-Jageman
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
plos one
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.99
H-Index - 332
ISSN - 1932-6203
DOI - 10.1371/journal.pone.0172636
Subject(s) - religious belief , replication (statistics) , epistemology , psychology , cognitive psychology , social psychology , philosophy , biology , virology
Gervais & Norenzayan (2012) reported in Science a series of 4 experiments in which manipulations intended to foster analytic thinking decreased religious belief. We conducted a precise, large, multi-site pre-registered replication of one of these experiments. We observed little to no effect of the experimental manipulation on religious belief ( d = 0.07 in the wrong direction, 95% CI[-0.12, 0.25], N = 941). The original finding does not seem to provide reliable or valid evidence that analytic thinking causes a decrease in religious belief.