Sensing the presence of gods and spirits across cultures and faiths

Tanya Marie Luhrmann; Kara Weisman; Felicity Aulino; Joshua D. Brahinsky; John C. Dulin; Vivian A. Dzokoto; Cristine H. Legare; Michael  Lifshitz; Emily Ng; Nicole  Ross-Zehndera; Rachel Smith

doi:10.1073/pnas.2016649118

Sensing the presence of gods and spirits across cultures and faiths

Tanya Marie Luhrmann^* (Corresponding Author), Kara Weisman, Felicity Aulino, Joshua D. Brahinsky, John C. Dulin, Vivian A. Dzokoto, Cristine H. Legare, Michael Lifshitz, Emily Ng, Nicole Ross-Zehndera, Rachel Smith

^*Corresponding author for this work

Anthropology

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

58 Citations (Scopus)

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Abstract

Hearing the voice of God, feeling the presence of the dead, being possessed by a demonic spirit—such events are among the most remarkable human sensory experiences. They change lives and in turn shape history. Why do some people report experiencing such events while others do not? We argue that experiences of spiritual presence are facilitated by cultural models that represent the mind as “porous,” or permeable to the world, and by an immersive orientation toward inner life that allows a person to become “absorbed” in experiences. In four studies with over 2,000 participants from many religious traditions in the United States, Ghana, Thailand, China, and Vanuatu, porosity and absorption played distinct roles in determining which people, in which cultural settings, were most likely to report vivid sensory experiences of what they took to be gods and spirits.

Original language	English
Article number	e2016649118
Number of pages	8
Journal	PNAS
Volume	118
Issue number	5
Early online date	25 Jan 2021
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2016649118
Publication status	Published - 2 Feb 2021

Bibliographical note

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. We thank the research teams and participants in each field site (see extended Acknowledgments in SI Appendix) and Hazel Markus and Ann Taves. This material is based on work supported by John Templeton Foundation Grant 55427. K.W. was also supported by the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (DGE-114747) and a William R. & Sara Hart Kimball Stanford Graduate Fellowship.

Data Availability Statement

This article contains supporting information online at https://www.pnas.org/lookup/suppl/ doi:10.1073/pnas.2016649118/-/DCSupplemental.
All study data are included in the article and/or supporting information.

Keywords

religion
porosity
absorption
spiritual experience
voices

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Cite this

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abstract = "Hearing the voice of God, feeling the presence of the dead, being possessed by a demonic spirit—such events are among the most remarkable human sensory experiences. They change lives and in turn shape history. Why do some people report experiencing such events while others do not? We argue that experiences of spiritual presence are facilitated by cultural models that represent the mind as “porous,” or permeable to the world, and by an immersive orientation toward inner life that allows a person to become “absorbed” in experiences. In four studies with over 2,000 participants from many religious traditions in the United States, Ghana, Thailand, China, and Vanuatu, porosity and absorption played distinct roles in determining which people, in which cultural settings, were most likely to report vivid sensory experiences of what they took to be gods and spirits.",

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Sensing the presence of gods and spirits across cultures and faiths

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Data Availability Statement

Keywords

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