r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 8h ago
Psychology Lower cognitive ability is linked to stronger Christian nationalist views, even after accounting for education
https://www.psypost.org/lower-cognitive-ability-is-linked-to-stronger-christian-nationalist-views-even-after-accounting-for-education/3.9k
u/ProfessionalMockery 8h ago
A lot of people here are just seeing the "Christian" in the headline and ignoring the "nationalist," which is probably more important.
I'm an atheist, so I think the claims religion makes are pretty dumb too, but nationalists, bigots, racists of any kind are consistently idiots, religious or not, and that has been established in plenty of other studies.
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u/Numeno230n 6h ago edited 5h ago
There are a lot of harmless dumb Christians I've met in my life, but Christian Nationalism is a specific form that involves violence, paranoia, and conspiracy thinking. They literally believe there are demonic forces behind left leaning political movements and this fuels both their religious delusions and their political violence.
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u/TM761152 3h ago
I prefer the term "Christofascism" to differentiate it from mainstream christianity, specifically the Calvanist right wing model and not the more left-leaning Methodist model.
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u/proteannomore 3h ago
specifically the Calvanist right wing model and not the more left-leaning Methodist model
Mention this to most christians and/or americans and they'll say, "huh?"
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u/Uncle_Istvannnnnnnn 1h ago
Actual conversation with a religious co-worker:
"What denomination are you?"
"Christian."
"Yeah, but what denomination?"
"What? Christian."
"Okay, what version of the bible do you read from?"
"The bible."
"Yeah, but what version?"
"I don't know what you mean. The bible."
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u/DeltaVZerda 1h ago
They must be fluent in Hebrew Aramaic and Greek
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u/Odd-Investigator-870 36m ago
Gosh that's a frustrating correlation isn't it? Don't understand philosophy, but will become a fundamentalist or literalist and treat select texts like an astrology puzzle from god to decrypt rationalizations for your beliefs.
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u/twoisnumberone 2h ago
It's a good term, and in my environment people will immediately understand it.
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u/lyacdi 2h ago
A significant percentage of people who would call themselves republican in 2026 believe there are demonic forces behind the left
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u/jkarovskaya 2h ago
All the while presenting ZERO evidence, factual proof or substantive argument that any "demons" exist in reality, or that there is any such thing as a "demonic force"
TL:DR>> ZERO!
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u/Endoroid99 26m ago
They don't need evidence, factual proof or a substantive argument to believe in religion in the first place. They have Faith.
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u/BitterTyke 4h ago
There are a lot of harmless dumb Christians
but they are already conditioned to believe in ephemeral things like being the chosen ones - basically the low hanging fruit.
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u/yeetboy 2h ago
There will always be varying levels of intelligence in the general population. The danger is when the less intelligent are manipulated and weaponized. And we’re watching this happen in real time in the US on the public stage. It is wild to see it so clearly from the outside while so many of those on the inside are completely oblivious to it.
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u/apple_kicks 7h ago
Yeah authoritarian types can still be atheists they just paint a different story but with the same end goal. They get to dictate and dominate others
Its just slightly more hopeful the people they are around will argue with them to prevent an easy path to power
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u/Piranata 5h ago
That's why i believe i became an Atheist twice after watching the Pervert's Guide to Ideology. I realized i was replacing God with the state or communism, plucking them out of heaven into a more physical form. I had to learn to actually criticize everything.
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u/triggirhape 2h ago
I realized i was replacing God with the state or communism, plucking them out of heaven into a more physical form. I had to learn to actually criticize everything.
What does this mean though? In the sense of looking for answers? Or just some core idea to center your life around?
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u/clubby37 1h ago
My very favourite song lyric is "question your answers / the truth has no anger." It's from a Collective Soul song called Blame.
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u/obeytheturtles 3h ago
But it all starts with the fundamental way religion teaches people how to think. It simply fails to provide people the tools needed to develop real moral intuition, or synthesize raw information into unique ideas. That's why the whole world is going crazy - there's a whole lot of people out there who just move through the world moment to moment, not thinking, not curious, and not interested in anything which isn't right in front of them. The modern religious concept of "faith" has literally trained people that ignoring facts and information in favor of mythology is the most righteous thing a person can do. And now we're so far deep into that feedback loop, even suggesting that the mythology holds value as allegory is heresy.
You cannot separate this nationalist movement from its Christian roots. No, religion is certainly not the only cognitive path to autocracy or bigotry, but it is certainly a reliable and predictable one.
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u/kittywiggles 3h ago
I have a lot of thoughts about Christian nationalism, and none of them are good. However, extreme forms of nationalism are found across a lot of different cultures in many different times, and seems to be an outcome of extreme tribalism. Adding the Christian flavoring to it does a great deal of harm, both to non-Christians and, frankly, to non-nationalist Christians. But to imply that the "nationalist" exists because of the "Christian" is a bit short-sighted.
I'd argue that Christian nationalism as a package is being pushed pretty strongly/is socially acceptable in certain circles - just as anti-communist leanings were in the 1950s in America, as nationalism was common in a certain European country in the 1930s and 40s, etc. They're loud and they do a lot of damage.
However, there are practicing Christians who I would argue are incredibly thoughtful, curious, and intellectually honest. They're rare, but I'd argue that people like that in general are rare, so of course they're going to show up less when looking at a demographic segment vs the population as a whole.
Coming through the evangelical industrial complex in America does tend to land more people in the Christian nationalism pool, through peer pressure as much as genuine belief, but again - less to do with faith, and more to do with communities.
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u/BigBlackWolf93 7h ago
I agree. I was raised religious and I still somewhat am religious, but nationalists have completely taken over the Christian identity. A lot that is preached out there, almost has nothing to do with Christianity. They'll pull out verses out of context to further push their nationalist agenda in the name of Christ.
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u/FluffyBunniesFurDayz 6h ago
I'd have to disagree with this take - the old testament is full of nationalist ideology. Just look at all the tribes the Israelites were told to destroy and/or enslave. All because they were god's special people. It's always treated like it's a good thing because these tribes were so "wicked".
To me, it makes perfect sense why many Christians are also nationalist.
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u/OkStop8313 5h ago
Yeah, but there are also plenty of passages that urge you to treat others well and make clear that that includes other tribes.
To me it just illustrates that whatever you go looking for in the Bible, you're going to find it. If you're a good person, you put a lot of emphasis on the "least of these" speech or the story of the Good Samaritan. If you're a bad person, you use the calls for oppression, rape, genocide, etc as a license.
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u/dorianvovin 2h ago
Yep. The Bible is not written with a single voice or ideology. Any attempt to use it to justify a given narrative requires negotiation with the text to emphasize certain passages over others.
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u/Spectre216 6h ago
I feel like you could make the argument that nationalism is just a tool that most religions employ in some respect, because you need to cement to people that they are the right one and everyone else falls under "the other" category. So it's not that religion (in this case Christianity) necessarily always containing nationalism, but that it's kind of hard to promote a monotheistic religion as the correct religion without also drawing the conclusion that the people and area that practice it are also the correct people.
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u/TheLesserWeeviI 5h ago
Religion is used as a tool to control people. Always has been.
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u/LittleKitty235 5h ago
That's why nearly ever ancient culture independently invented the concept of god and religion, and none arrived at the same one. It's not proof of a higher power, it's proof it is a useful tool.
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u/AnarchyArcher 5h ago
I don’t disagree overall, I want to make the distinction that while most religions do something to this effect, it’s not essential for the spiritual practices. If anything nationalism in religion is the manipulative support for the whole that corrodes the individual to conform to the ‘right’ principles by demonizing other options.
Which is just sad honestly- the creativity and community we collectively can share being reduced to ancient beliefs and prejudices.
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u/merijn2 6h ago
Yeah, I haven't read the research this article is about, but according to the article it focused on Christian Nationalists, so it compared these with other people. The Christian part of Christian nationalism isn't very deep. The nationalism part describes that it is about caring for an in-group, and keeping certain people out. The Christian part just describes who they see as the out-group, namely non-Christians (although it isn't just non-Christians, also people of other ethnicities who are Christians are not in the in-group). Their Christianity is all about identity, and not about the underlying ethical or metaphysical claims.
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u/zorkzamboni 4h ago
A lot of people here are just seeing the "Christian" in the headline and ignoring the "nationalist," which is probably more important.
Those are the exact people this is talking about. They feel called out by it and they're telling on themselves like they always do.
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u/happyilyrednow 6h ago
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u/thenationalcranberry 6h ago
Michael, you can’t just say the word “source” and expect anything to happen.
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u/SvenHudson 4h ago
On the subject of source, I clicked the Source button under their comment and I'm seeing they did actually attach a URL but accidentally left the word "source" out of their brackets so it's attached to nothing.
This is their intended link, formatted so as to be clickable.
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u/Montgomery000 6h ago
It's two of the same thing, people who base their principles on beliefs that have no evidence and can't be proven. God is real, the United States is the best country in the world and white people are the supreme race don't tend to mix well with critical thinking.
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u/chum-guzzling-shark 5h ago
the dumbest people you will find are the same ones that fly their countries flag like its a badge of honor
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u/StephenFish 4h ago
The bigger problem is people ignoring the "is linked to", which is one of the weakest phrases in science. But the science sub is usually filled with people who don't understand science anyway.
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u/atreeismissing 5h ago
Christianity literally teaches you to ignore facts and instead take the claims your "leader" makes as the ultimate truth, I don't think people are ignoring the nationalist part of it because the Christian part of it has a centuries long history of purposefully lowering cognitive ability.
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u/HueMannAccnt 6h ago
but nationalists, bigots, racists of any kind are consistently idiots, religious or not, and that has been established in plenty of other studies.
Would fanatics be a better word to encapsulate the multiple groups you mention?
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u/108_TFS 5h ago
Authoritarian Followers, to use one of the terms of Professor Bob Altemeyer from the University of Winnipeg. He spent his career studying authoritarians and what goes on in their heads, and collected his findings in the book The Authoritarians. You can get a digital copy for free from theauthoritarians.org.
...I said in the Introduction that we would figure out why authoritarian followers think in the bizarre and perplexing way they so often do. The key to the puzzle springs from Chapter 2's observation that, first and foremost, followers have mainly copied the beliefs of the authorities in their lives. They have not developed and thought through their ideas as much as most people have. Thus almost anything can be found in their heads if their authorities put it there, even stuff that contradicts other stuff. A filing cabinet or a computer can store quite inconsistent notions and never lose a minute of sleep over their contradiction. Similarly a high RWA can have all sorts of illogical, self-contradictory, and widely refuted ideas rattling around in various boxes in his brain, and never notice it.
So can everybody, of course, and my wife loves to catch inconsistencies in my reasoning when we’re having a friendly discussion about one of my personal failures. But research reveals that authoritarian followers drive through life under the influence of impaired thinking a lot more than most people do, exhibiting sloppy reasoning, highly compartmentalized beliefs, double standards, hypocrisy, self-blindness, a profound ethnocentrism, and--to top it all off--a ferocious dogmatism that makes it unlikely anyone could ever change their minds with evidence or logic...→ More replies (2)7
u/WaythurstFrancis 6h ago
Indeed. We should not be surprised that a stupid ideology is followed by stupid people.
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u/Weewoofiatruck 4h ago
Alot of people here aren't even reading the article and following to the research. Which is just a one paragraph abstract with the authors theory, but ZERO work, ZERO evidence.
It's a click bait title that leads to a click bait article with a nothing burger research paper.
My gut says this is true, but this article is absolutely nothing. The referenced research is even more of nothing.
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u/HeinieKaboobler 2h ago
The one paragraph you are referencing is just the paper's abstract. The whole paper is much longer and uses quite a bit of data/analysis, as you would know, if you had actually read the article.
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u/ChrisKateBushFroome 2h ago
I'm not sure what link you're following, but it's a 13 page paper in a peer-reviewed journal, using data from the GSS covering 1989 to 2024.
It might not be directly accessible if you don't have the right subscription/institutional access though.
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u/Putrid-Reputation-68 7h ago
"Since the masses are fickle, full of unruly desires, passionate, and reckless... they must be held in check by invisible terrors and suchlike pageantry. It was not for nothing that the ancients introduced notions concerning the gods." - Polybius 150 B.C.E
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u/MostlySlime 8h ago
Those people would not navigate a secular paradise peacefully
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u/knowledgeable_diablo 8h ago
Nor would they want to. Most of them are in the “nanny me harder daddy!” Camp.
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u/Apathetic_Zealot 7h ago
And they directly seek to make the population intellectualy weak too by cutting education funds and pushing religion in school.
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u/BMW_wulfi 7h ago
The followers of JC have had their business model exposed for a while now. It’s crazy because it’s probably been obvious to most people of moderate intellect for like… two thousand years
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u/MrSpindles 7h ago
Indeed. All religion is a system to indoctrinate people from the earliest age to unquestioningly believe things for which there can be no evidence.
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u/CHERNO-B1LL 8h ago
Simple things. Convenient answers to complex problems favoured over accepting nuance and challenging alternative perspectives or engaging with uncomfortable truths.
A wizard did it. Immigrants did it. Gay people did it. The Jews did it. God has a plan. The government knows what it's doing. Taylor swift is good at music. Mainstream is the best stream.
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u/0ldgrumpy1 7h ago
Exactly, fear of complexity, inability to understand complexity, either one. Demanding simple answers to everything, even when there isnt one. There was a book going back to the George W days called " The Republican Brain, the Science of why they reject Science." It pointed straight at fear of complexity.
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u/VSWanter 7h ago
It pointed straight at fear of complexity.
I wonder if this is why the us vs them tropes are so effective. Having someone to make the enemy, allows the fear and hate to be easily and effectively focused. Critical thinking doesn't have to happen, because it's assumed to have already been done by someone else. Questioning the reasoning behind why someone would create such a narrative, rather than assuming it forming naturally, requires exactly the type of complex thought that simple people would reject.
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u/2Completion2Ography 7h ago
This is why they hate the term "non-binary". Binary thinking is easy.
The irony is, black & white photos would look terrible if there was no grey area.
Edit: TIL there's a swear filter for sh-t on r/science.
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u/SyfaOmnis 7h ago
It's less "stupid" things and more that they make use of cognitive tools that they've developed to "understand" things incorrectly. Leaps of logic, mental shortcuts, fallacious reasoning, tribalism/ingrouping, superstition, misplaced trust in authorities with their own agendas. Their really big killer is second order critical thinking.
Many also get frustrated and angry when they're "wrong" or asked to re-evaluate, or lapse into ego defense. I'll also be honest, a great deal of the time it isn't even "stupidity", it's genuine intellectual laziness and fundamental incuriosity; most are not "dumb" people they may even be highly educated or trained in particular fields, but they are afforded the luxury of not ever having to "care".
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u/crossdtherubicon 8h ago
Alot of religious ideology is ingested through early development and reinforced through the environment. This has been pretty well-documented, although it isn't an exclusive pathway to acquiring religious beliefs.
In light of this article I'm curious if cognitive ability simply never fully develops (or is restricted somehow) in that context. Or if there are also subpopulations wherein a relative lower congitive ability allows for an easier ingestion of religious beliefs (or likewise is perceived as reasonably easier to understand).
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u/CrashCalamity 8h ago
As a friend to several ex-mormons, I can at least provide counter-example to your first hypothesis. While a highly religious upbringing might not help matters, the emergence of higher cognitive function and critical thought can and does occur. The kids who "ask too many questions during bible study", or those who become exposed to other faiths through college, work, and the internet all start asking themselves how invested they are in their beliefs. It can be especially jarring when they discover how oppressed they were by what is effectively a cult doctrine (as they've told me.)
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u/knowledgeable_diablo 8h ago
That was me in Bible studies as a kiddie. I was one of probably the only person in the room who’d actually read the Bible (teacher included) so I started questioning and asking them uncomfortable questions right from the get go.
Guess that’s what happens when you are raised with no TV and reading is your only outlet and you’re stuck in a religious school.
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u/360walkaway 6h ago
Wonder how many people would believe in their chosen religion if they were first introduced to it when they were a full adult, instead of when they are still Santa Claus eligible.
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u/Xalipu 4h ago
Do you really want to know how many born again Christians exist, because they’re insufferable
So is pretty much every other adult who converted to something
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u/Aggravating_Duck_192 4h ago
Born-again, less the people who converted because of addiction or incarceration. Those situations make people vulnerable to indoctrination at any age.
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u/Lilfrankieeinstein 7h ago
Seems like there’s a type of survivorship bias baked into studies like this where people with higher cognitive abilities are less inclined to hold these values as they grow and learn.
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u/wontyoujointhedance 6h ago
Well that’s what I think it’s ultimately trying to demonstrate. Those values are typically incompatible with both being smart and a good person.
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u/geoken 5h ago
I think that part is accepted, but I think it's still an interesting question.
I wonder what effects it has on your cognitive growth to think about concepts like the infinite, the solar system and how nature works in general. I'd think at 3 or 4 years old, most kids either are starting to think about that stuff - or have those lines of inquiry snuffed out and told "it's god doing it with magic".
I'm sure for many kids, the curiosity will overcome anyone telling them not to think about it. But I wonder if for some it doesn't, and for that subset - whether or not it has impact on their cognitive growth.
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u/Long9696 5h ago
I have heard that autistic people are less likely to be religous. Not sure if it's scientifically proven or not.
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u/Cent1234 6h ago
I've always said the best way to turn a Christian to an Athiest is to have them actually read the Bible.
There's a reason all of the major Abrahamic religions evolve a massive EU of supplementary material.
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u/kinkyshibby 6h ago
Asking why and informing the "teachers" the answers they were giving didn't make sense got me kicked out of CCD. And Sunday school.
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u/Sycophantic-Feline 6h ago
I was raised in a nun school and asking genuine questions about stuff I thought didn't make any sense was always met with aggression and punishment.
It's how I figured something was deeply wrong with all of it, I recall it was so annoying to me as a kid/young teen how no one else seemed to question ANY of it, eventually I just had to suck it up and pretend I believed in all that nonsense because it'd also get me into trouble at home
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u/KriegMorgan 5h ago
Narrowly dodged an in school suspension because I did competitive speaking in high school and did a sales pitch for the bible on the merits of it as a piece of entertainment. One of the parent chaperones (re: volunteer student uber) complained to admin about my pitch and I found myself staring down the prospect of having to spend a couple of days sitting in the admin office doing nothing and getting 0's.
I managed to argue my way out of it on the basis that the competitive speaking league wasn't exclusive to just catholic schools and included public schools with the rules specifically excluding proselytizing.
Turns out pointing out how the bible includes so much salacious content like sex and violence makes people cranky when it's all right there for anyone to read.
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u/mcove97 4h ago
Yeah I questioned it, but kept my questions to myself as a kiddie in fear of upsetting my parents. So when they asked me why I refused to go to church with them when I was 12, I said cause it was boring. Theres no Christian counter argument to that, I knew that. But really it was because everything about church and the Bible felt off. Like confessing being a guilty sinner, when I didnt feel guilty about anything. The whole church thing was just nonsensical to me. I didn't get anything from going. If anything I just became anxious from sitting in church.
And while I was nowhere near as knowledgeable then as I was now. I think maybe my curiosity, combined with my keen eye of observation an quite keen analytical sense is how I bypassed the attempted indoctrination. As a child I would rather observe and analyze situations rather than interact. I would think about the activity, rather than participate in it. And thats how I realized. Hold up? Why are we chanting, singing and confessing that we are guilty sinners? Thats exactly what's making me feel bad. Hence the icky anxiety and uncomfortable restlessness I experienced during sermons that made me want to leave. And thats what I intuitively picked up as a child, even though I didn't have the words to verbalize it well yet.
Honestly, if priests understood psychology, they wouldn't even dream about telling their congregation or audience that they are guilty, because that's just enforcing their audience experiences of guilt, so they keep coming back to church endlessly to be liberated from the guilt the church is inducing into their psyche. It's completely self-defeating and contradictory.
So I also think personality traits is a significant factor.
Having sharp analytical abilities. Curiosity. Valuing truth and freedom over conformity. Thats a sign that someone won't last as a Christian.
On the other side, people who value conformity, group belonging, rituals, a shared sense of belonging. Those will resonate better with being the "sheep or flock of Christ" aka Christian. Contra someone who don't value group conformity over walking their own path alone etc. As a child, I would be just fine not participating in activities and just people watch on the side line how other kids and adults interact and ponder why. Because I wanted to understand social interactions, more than actually participating in them. So, I never was a good candidate for Christianity.
Though I suppose I took the message "seek and you shall find" a bit too seriously. Because that took me seeking outside of Christianity. And its one of the things that I personally don't think Christians do enough. Because seeking to understand something means never-ending questioning.
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u/duxpdx 8h ago
There are reasons why the further one gets away from Salt Lake City the more cafeteria Mormons and Ex-Mormons one finds. Why do you think after destroying K-12 education in this country Republicans are going after colleges and universities next? Why are they trying to force religion, specifically Christianity, into all elements of life? Children are naturally curious and for many the indoctrination done at a young age is irreversible. Some manage to rebel in their teenage years, and others if and when they are older and through either life experiences and/or higher education learn to actually think critically and can change, but not all. Most are too far gone, so much of their life and relationships are defined by their religious upbringing that breaking free carries too high a price both emotionally and monetarily.
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u/Coroebus 6h ago
Religious indoctrination is child abuse, and that child abuse stunts their emotional and intellectual development. Evangelical Christianity and other extremist sects are especially toxic and harmful.
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u/Limp_Bookkeeper_5992 5h ago
Absolutely. I was blown away when I found out later in life that there are organizations and therapists who’s specialty is helping people recover from religion. You don’t realize how much religion breaks your brain until you’re out of it and have someone to help show you how to heal.
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u/JackKnifeNiffy 6h ago
As someone in their 30s still unpacking the psychological trauma of being raised in the church, could not agree more
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u/ChelleInSand 7h ago
This was my personal experience too. However, I will say for people who are brought up in religious environments it can be extremely difficult to walk away from the faith altogether because that means walking away from your social support structures in many cases.
Many highly religious people will even ostracize their own children for becoming atheist or changing to a new religion. So it is easier to just not think about it to avoid causing waves and losing friends and family.
I had weak familial bonds and an abusive family with few established roots in any community so it was easier for me to do. But I can see how people who have families that are very wrapped up in the church scene would just rather not explore those feelings of doubt because they are literally risky to their support structures in life.
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u/Cent1234 6h ago
Andrew Garfield in Under The Banner Of Heaven does an excellent portrayal of a Mormon who is forced to truly examine his beliefs for the first time, loses his faith, and then runs smack into the wall of 'but if you ever actually let anybody at all know, you'll lose your family, your friends, your community and everything else you've anchored yourself to' and how shattering that is.
It also portrays how insidious religious indoctrination from childhood is.
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u/mcove97 4h ago
Yes it was similar for me. I never felt particularly close to either of my parents. I definitely didn't feel connected to the church or church community. I went only cause my parents did. My mom was really into the church scene, but it was really adult centric so I felt as if I was a tag-along.
To make the blow lesser for my mom, I largely kept my mouth shut about my beliefs until my 20s to avoid arguments, but stopped going as a kid cause I didn't like going to church. It upset my parents initially and we had a big argument over it right before church when I was 12.. but then they had to just leave me at home.. because they would miss church if they didnt. And since I was more stubborn than any of my parents, they couldn't physically drag me to church, so they gave up and left. And yeah, I realized from that point on, it's better to stay tight lipped, and just don't argue or give any reasons why I didn't go to church.
Now as an adult, I do discuss it with my parents, but the issue for them now is they cant out argue me, because I am far too educated and knowledgeable about philosophy, religion, psychology, history, so they just leave it alone because they get frustrated with how knowledable I am, and I also expose the flaws in their thinking which they really dislike because it means they are challenged to re-examine their beliefs.. which they dont want to do, which means they understand its better to leave it alone. As a child I did not have that tool-box of knowledge.
But in the end I like to bring up how having a good family dynamic is more important than our beliefs in the end. Being right is not more important than doing the right thing, which is being respectful and kind to each other. And then they dont really have much to say.
So yeah the type of religious familial and communal relationship dynamics definitely matter.
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u/ButcherPetesWagon 6h ago
When I was in school in the early 90s i remember learning about Greek mythology in class and how the teacher made it clear that these were old beliefs and not real, like Christianity (Canada french catholic school). I remember asking how we know that our beliefs are real. I don't remember her answer or anything but I do know my mom got called into the school after that.
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u/KogasaGaSagasa 8h ago
Still, I wonder if it's not something that could possibly be reinforced. Like if you express your curiosity or thoughts, your guardians (parents, pastor, etc) might punish you for it. Wouldn't a child be conditioned into a state where they would intentionally deny their own cognition and curiosity, in that case, in fear of punishment? And overtime, become underdeveloped.
This isn't my area of expertise, so I am genuinely just curious.
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u/Sherry_Brandt 7h ago
it absolutely can. it won't work on everyone - hence the stories of rebels and ex-______, but it does have an impact.
makes me think about how educational attainment is correlated to less dementia - ofc there are other factors in educational attainment, but using your brain consistently, and being trained how, does seem to have an impact independently of socioeconomic factors (like learning spatial skills, a new language, a new instrument, etc in midlife is also protective for later dementia).
so, the converse is also true - using your brain less leads to being less able to use your brain, over time.
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u/Coroebus 6h ago
Yes, this is why people have been rightly naming religious indoctrination as child abuse.
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u/wontyoujointhedance 6h ago
There’s a saying in neuropsychology — “neurons that wire together fire together.” I don’t see any reason that wouldn’t apply to things like seeking out new information, asking questions about opposing views, and internally questioning the narratives authority figures in their lives when they’re regularly punished for those things.
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u/KlingoftheCastle 5h ago
My dad used to always say: “How can you tell if someone was raised catholic? They’re atheist”.
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u/genobeam 8h ago
I was raised in a fundamentalist Christian environment including homeschooling, going to church several times a week for regular service, youth group, Sunday school. Went to a fundamentalist Christian college.
I don't think it's that lower cognitive abilities don't generate, but when you have high cognitive abilities you get filtered out eventually. I was fully indoctrinated until late high school when things started not adding up and I was done half way through college.
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u/Xalipu 4h ago
Crippling intellect is generally to the benefit of fundies. There was a particularly nasty group of Puritans sent to my province that called all books evil, including the bible. Can’t have the hoi polloi learning anything, they might get out of control.
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u/kheret 8h ago
Certainly people in highly religious environments are discouraged from developing critical thinking skills
Also homeschooling can’t help
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u/AldoRaine-1 8h ago
If you think about it, they land on polar opposite sides of the spectrum: critical thinking is to take a puzzle and put it together piece by piece, forming a larger more cohesive picture.
Belief is having a single red puzzle piece and the person holding the box says "what you are looking at is a blue sailboat", and saying "yep, this IS a blue boat", even when the only indication you could have otherwise (your red puzzle piece) doesn't support their statement, at all.
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u/GothicFuck 7h ago
Belief is knowing the red puzzle piece is part of a blue sailboat puzzle because the preacher made you believe. You just know eventually it'll go into the rest of the puzzle and make that sailboat when you die.
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u/Cent1234 6h ago
Yup. "Faith" is defined as 'belief without evidence.' But when the evidence contradicts your belief, 'faith' becomes 'belief despite evidence.'
To her dying day, my grandmother, raised Catholic, genuinely believed that men have one fewer rib than women, despite the fact that at any point in her seventy some-odd years, she could have simply counted her own ribs, then counted her husband's.
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u/apple_kicks 7h ago
It’s essentially built in. Probably why clergy attracts predators and authoritarian types. Its built in that you can’t break or question doctrine. That you will lose community benefits. You give and give for rewards you may never materially see.
What’s interesting is this isn’t always in religions. Many do allow for questions and arguments or even non hierarchical systems. But US goes hard on hierarchy and militarism levels of unquestioned loyalty.
I bet cold war made this worse. Like stripping more collective or socialist parts of Christianity made this fascist soup boil over
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u/Livid_Lemurs_Leaping 7h ago
Idk but I got away from Christian Nationalism once I started thinking about it ....those still in it seem to me like they just don't care enough to think about it. Idk, it's weird. I don't think they are fundamentally incapable, but they just.... don't. Denial maybe? Not wanting to be bothered by what's hard/difficult? It confuses me....
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u/Pao_Did_NothingWrong 7h ago
Oh it develops. We either kill ourselves or go low/no contact with our families. I chose the second option, fortunately.
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u/DarthBluntSaber 8h ago
Which is why I always find it hilarious and wildly hypocritical when they accuse public education of "indoctrinating" children, but then they use churches to guilt trip and teach hate to kindergarteners in Sunday school who dont yet have the ability to think critically or view the stories as anything but literal. THATS indoctrination.
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u/dontshoveit 7h ago
The fact they they indoctrinate children using the church is the reason they believe the other side must do the same. (Schools must indoctrinate kids the same as they do.) Which isn't true but that's why they think that.
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u/apple_kicks 7h ago
Anything outside their control or compromises their control is seen as an enemy
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u/Livid_Lemurs_Leaping 6h ago
Yeah....but with Christian Nationalism, it's often much more subtle and insidious. When you're in it, it doesn't look like hate and it's rarely spoken about directly.... it's more dog whistles and what not. Sure there are obvious examples we can all point to and then wonder how people could follow this nonsense, but in the actual mainstream churches (and they are everywhere) it's not obvious. I suspect the average person could attend a mainstream church service and not know what to listen for to be able to pick up on the very subtle cues indicating whether or not that church is sympathetic to or promoting Christian Nationalism (because again, in my experience, is rarely spoken about it loud and obvious ways to a congregation.
In my opinion, this is why it's so dangerous.
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u/NoKids__3Money 7h ago
The only people I know who had a secular upbringing and became religious later in life ended up being schizophrenic or having a brain tumor
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u/ImAShaaaark 8h ago
Cognitive ability is heritable, if the most zealously religious are less capable it would make sense that their children would have a good chance of also being less capable. That's not to say that environmental issues couldn't stunt that development, but if we are talking about baseline potential it makes sense even excluding environmental factors.
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u/NotOnApprovedList 6h ago
The lower vocabulary thing can be a product of environment rather than genetics. If you're not reading books, or consuming other media with a higher vocabulary, you end up using simpler words.
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u/NuclearTurtle 6h ago
The study was not about religious beliefs, it was about political beliefs about religion. 2/3rds of Americans are christian, less than 1/6th of those actually think the US should be a christian theocracy
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u/Pleasant-Flounder540 6h ago
this is the wrong takeaway. nearly everyone was religious a century ago, it's simply cultural, nothing more. isaac newton dedicated principia to god (although was likely a deist). there are many, many examples of highly educated and successful people who are even devoutly religious.
the reality is that christian nationalism is simply the default culture in america and has been for roughly the entire history of the country in some form. atheism is a choice that people generally have to actively make, so it's restricted already, but it's also true that people with lower cognitive ability are far less likely to question the status quo to begin with.
basically, if you raise everyone to be christian and nationalistic, assuming a bell curve of intelligence, only people a few standard deviations above the mean are even questioning the status quo. you end up with all the straight up stupids being christian nationalist by default.
if we went back to the Roman Empire of Constantine, the stupids were pagan and Christianity was the religion of the educated and elite. it's cultural.
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u/dplans455 5h ago
We are not religious people in our family but we live in a town that has a high population of Catholics. I don't begrudge them their beliefs, believe whatever you want. But I have a problem with indoctrination of children. You want to indoctrinate your own kids, fine. But don't teach your kids that it's their responsibility to "spread the word of god" to every single one of their friends at school.
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u/buttorsomething 8h ago
Would this not be accurate to all types of religious extremism?
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u/FlyAirLari 5h ago
Possibly to all sorts of extremisms.
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u/tealstealmonkey 2h ago
I haven't met any extremism that can hold up to critical thinking and self-reflection.
In think that in order to believe it, you have to suspend these two things and become blind. If only in these specific circumstances, quite a few people manage to be smart, intelligent or even caring outside the topics of their extremism.
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u/SeeTigerLearn 6h ago
Something I wrote during the pandemic when I began to notice a strong correlation between religious zealots (evangelicals, my family) and antivaxxers:
“When the very core of one's reality is based on religious dogma, and therefore an entire belief system latticework depends on denial of facts, even praising one's ability to go with gut (faith) rather than science, then an entire population has been conditioned to reject facts even when shown the empirical evidence.”
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u/MonsterkillWow 4h ago
Yeah because the entire basis of religion is belief without evidence.
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u/FogBankDeposit 3h ago
Very much this. Once you’ve entered the door of no evidence required to believe, you’re susceptible to a whole host of manipulations.
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u/Unable-Log-4870 3h ago
There are a few beliefs (that’s I’m aware of) that I hold without evidence, even in the face of contrary evidence.
Primarily, the belief that we are better than this.
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u/Taylorenokson 2h ago
Not even just belief without evidence, but a built in guilt system that punishes even having the tiniest thought of doubt.
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u/Jonn_Jonzz_Manhunter 3h ago
It is darkly true. When I was doing my theology degree, we mostly did history and theory but when we did a massive your of different Christian belief systems, when we got to American Evangelicals and Catholic Nationalists, it all went to hell so fast
For the most part, organised Christianity aren't very suspicious of government and medical stuff, but their are certain sects that just do not care at all, even when you can show someone, even intelligent people, the evidence calmly and correctly, you just can't convince them otherwise
There's a reason other Christians don't consider those religious interpretations to be actually Christians because they abandon so many of the actual important stuff
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u/JohnLockeJaw 2h ago
I have a nearly identical quote in my notes from the same period.
"When your belief system relies on the continuous rejection of basic scientific facts, you lose the ability to distinguish truth from fiction and become ever more vulnerable to snake-oil, dogma, and bigotry."
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u/morbo-2142 8h ago edited 5h ago
Always fun to have empirical data to back up repeated anecdotal experiences by anyone with eyes and a brain living in the United States.
It's scary to have to find your place in the world and make decisions for yourself.
It's hard to make choices and having a ready framework that tells you how to live and what to care about offloads much of the mental tax of navigating reality.
It's hard to live by an internal code and evaluate every new situation against it and more importantly change it when new information is presented.
The real tragedy is the existence of groups that foster these feelings in vulnerable people in order to advance their own agenda and aquire new non disruptive members.
It's almost a form of abuse. How many people lose time and money to predatory fundamentalist organizations who are strung along and squeezed dry for basically nothing in return.
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u/Xsiah 8h ago
It's not like atheist children are just roughin' it - if you grew up with parents, went to school, grew up in society with laws and stuff - you have a framework. It isn't any harder or scarier than what religious people go through, especially given that they don't actually follow their framework a whole lot of the time.
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u/morbo-2142 8h ago
Society does do a lot of work to 'fill the void' as such I agree. It's that some people can't handle ambiguity or uncertainty.
It does take more mental energy to evaluate things as they come and change your mind if presented with good arguments or evidence.
If you grew up without religion and explored the big questions yourself most people can cope with the lack of answers.
Some people get lost in the woods of the big philosophical questions like life's purpose, universal justice, or hard solipsism. There are non religious answers or at least attempts at answers to these but they lack the conviction and concreteness of the answers religions (especially Christian ones) provide.
Having the answers to the big questions and readymade framework those questions fit into is comfortable and reassuring.
The truth is that most people (in the us at least) are religious to some degree and if they fall out of it suddenly their frame of reference and world is wildly uncertain.
Im sure there are some people not raised religious who fall into it for the answers it gives as well as the framework it provides.
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u/super-wookie 8h ago
It absolutely is a form of abuse. Human generated mental illness on other humans.
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u/AllanfromWales1 MA | Natural Sciences | Metallurgy & Materials Science 8h ago
Any thoughts on whether this is a worldwide issue (though obviously with different religions) or whether it is specific to the USA?
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u/mimivirus2 8h ago
Absolutely not exclusive to the US or christianity
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u/Which-Acanthaceae613 7h ago
100% you see this in Muslim, Jewish and Hindu countries too. To have faith you have to be practised in the ability to accept a belief without evidence. To be able to stop thinking critically at some point about a flying horse, man parting a sea or a gods that engage in warfare.
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u/jaspersgroove 5h ago
When your worldview is built on a foundation of thought-terminating cliches your critical thinking skill development will inevitably suffer.
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u/SunGreene42 6h ago
Exactly, you're not working your critical thinking muscles, so to speak, if you just accept beliefs without evidence, or thought.
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u/AlteredEinst 8h ago
You can see the evidence of it everywhere; it's just loudest in the U.S., because that's most of the world's focus.
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u/MrVeazey 7h ago
I also think there has been a concerted effort in the US, for several decades, to weaken basic educational standards and remove critical thinking from the curriculum in order to make the public more gullible, thus easier to manipulate.
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u/bigladnang 8h ago
It probably pertains more to the western world because we’ve had a larger secularization, and religious belief is less universal.
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u/HueMannAccnt 6h ago
or whether it is specific to the USA?
There are fanatics in every nation causing hassle for people that just want to be.
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u/KingOfEthanopia 8h ago
I think a lot of it comes down to where you grew up and how conformist your personality is.
With high conformity in a highly religious area religion becomes a blind spot to many.
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u/St_Boogz 7h ago
Yea it is world wide, many studies have been done on dogmatic right wing beliefs and regardless of culture, you’re slightly dumber than alternatives. They are not positions that require much cognition.
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u/GWsublime 8h ago
Why would one expect this to be limited to the US?
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u/AllanfromWales1 MA | Natural Sciences | Metallurgy & Materials Science 7h ago
I suspect that cultural differences across the world would affect the extent to which this is true. Nationalism (whether religious or otherwise) is much stronger in some countries than in others.
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u/GWsublime 7h ago
True, but it tends to have the same flaws and the same requirement that you not think to hard about your beliefs.
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u/Decievedbythejometry 7h ago
No way an incoherent and irrational worldview correlates with not being able to think straight I am shocked
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u/TheBarnard 3h ago
Surprise surprise
Nationalism is pretty antithetical to the teachings of Christ so you have to be pretty regarded to be a Christian nationalist
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u/shadowsinthestars 6h ago
And there I thought I was being too mean "just" calling them uneducated. Turns out it's worse.
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u/000extra 3h ago
Makes sense, you’re likely to be less intelligent if you can still believe in a sky god and a human written book in the face of science and evidence that lead to the contrary.
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u/Moistfruitcake 2h ago
Science has a PR problem. If they called microorganisms 'demons', genes 'past-life memories', and climate change 'hellmouth opening' we'd be an entirely enlightened society.
That's why I tell any climate deniers that burning fossil fuels releases vengeful dinosaur ghosts.
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u/Japhyharrison 7h ago edited 4h ago
A fundamentalist mindset is a stunted, fixed mindset built on fear
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u/Glum-Cheetah-3708 8h ago
I mean I think more so it comes down to a disenfranchised ability to reason . I would expect it to be the same for other religions as well .
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u/Weewoofiatruck 6h ago
As much as I believe this... I can't take this article seriously.
This link leads to a website, not even the research. BUT the website does link to the research... which is this
And that research is nothing but a long paragraph abstract. No work, no evidence, nothing.
My gut says this is true, but this is just a click bait headline leading to a click bait article referencing a nothing burger study with nothing concrete.
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u/RegularOrMenthol 3h ago
If you read the data sources below the abstract, it details that the “GSS wordsum vocabulary test” was used to measure both vocabulary and critical thinking skills. It’s apparently a classic test that is a kind of shorter precursor to the IQ test.
So obviously, people with Christian nationalist beliefs scored lower on that test. Make whatever conclusions you will about that.
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u/FantaWarlord 5h ago
Whether one disagrees with the link you provided or not, there is literally a button on that page that links to read the full text, which opens a much longer document (if you have access to Wiley) that has graphs, data, references, etc.
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u/AkkeBrakkeKlakke 7h ago
Same thing goes for racism. No surprise here.
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u/Darksider123 6h ago
It's a sort of mental offloading or laziness. Instead of judging everyone individually, it's easier to judge groups of people based on their looks or background. And they have already made up their minds long before meeting someone new, so that's another mental task avoided
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u/ladeeedada 8h ago
You can't always reason with someone but they can feel emotions and fear is the easiest way to manipulate people. There's nothing like the fear of eternal hellfire to get ppl to do your bidding. And unfortunately most of the dumbest people you will meet are also the most confident in their beliefs since they lack the capacity to question them.
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u/apple_kicks 7h ago
Cambridge Analytica was eye opening on how everyone has a few fear points that can be manipulated. People stop thinking when in panic mode and behave dangerously
US Christianity has monopolised the big ones from family and death
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u/SunGreene42 6h ago
"People are stupid. They can be made to believe any lie because either they want to believe it's true or because they are afraid it's true." -- Terry Goodkind
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u/NoConfusion9490 6h ago
Most of these people aren't the least bit afraid of going to hell. That's not even possible to them because they're "good" other people are "bad". I'd say the real allure is that anyone they disagree with is automatically wrong and destined for cosmic retribution.
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u/gottagotothebathroom 6h ago
"I was raised to..."
Across the board, this is a point of pride for people with lower cognitive ability, and means less and less as the ability to reason improves. There's nothing surprising about this or any other beliefs that are typically forced onto young children.
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u/Isphet71 8h ago
Imho one absolutely vital function of religion throughout history has been to give all people some sort of moral framework to live by, so that society can stay relatively structured over multiple generations.
Not everyone is capable of devising and living by their own heavily personalized code of ethics. The vast majority of people are simply followers that get told what they beleive, and who to vote for, and go with that. I rarely if ever see someone more complicated than "I am religion A and politically B" and otherwise dont seem to have their own thoughts and standards about either that deviate from the norm.
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u/LivInTheLookingGlass 4h ago
Historically that isn't universal. In the time of the Greeks that was separated into religion (how the world works) and philosophy (how people should work). To quote one of the various intros to Meditations
[Philosophy] was not merely a subject to write or argue about, but one that was expected to provide a "design for living"—a set of rules to live one's life by. This was a need not met by ancient religion, which privileged ritual over doctrine and provided little in the way of moral and ethical guidelines. Nor did anyone expect it to. That was what philosophy was for.
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u/TheOtherHobbes 7h ago
You can - and should - have shared morals without religion. Secular humanism is a perfectly workable moral system and can be taught without the threat of hellfire, crusades, or genocide.
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u/RequirementNo2161 7h ago
Remember when this sub actually had science in it? 80% of social science is in reproducible garbage done for political aims
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u/pridento 4h ago
This sub has been a pop-sci sub for a long time. One of the worst subreddits for scientific discussion.
Actually, you can’t even say the name of the tabloid that’s linked because the mods spam articles from it and auto-delete any comments pointing out it is not a scientific reference.
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u/agangofoldwomen 8h ago
Religion is a fairy tale for children. It’s crazy to me that adults can, in all seriousness, believe there’s a man in robes with a beard in the sky that controls everything and that if you close your eyes and imagine you’re talking to him he will help you win at sports.
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u/mvea Professor | Medicine 8h ago
Lower cognitive ability is linked to stronger Christian nationalist views, even after accounting for education
A new study indicates that Americans with lower scores on a vocabulary test commonly used to measure cognitive ability are more likely to endorse Christian nationalist beliefs, even when accounting for their overall level of education. The findings suggest that the appeal of this political and religious ideology relates to underlying cognitive resources rather than just differences in schooling. The research was published in Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion.
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u/ze_shotstopper 5h ago
I have concerns about using a vocabulary test to measure cognitive ability. It is a very narrow aspect of intelligence and I would argue heavily confounded by other factors.
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u/BananaJelloXlii 7h ago
That's painfully obvious. Smart, stable people do not become Christian Nationalists.
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u/pirate135246 7h ago
Religion is a coping method for fear of the unknown. Assign a fairy tale to answer all the scary unknown problems of the universe and life itself.
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u/legit-posts_1 7h ago
Not that I don't believe it, but I'd like to know exactly how you measure that. It's common knowledge that IQ tests are best at measuring how you do on an IQ test. So what's the measurement here?
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u/Critical_Interest706 8h ago
Every post on here is just “everyone I disagree with is stupid! Here’s a study that says so! You aren’t gonna disagree with SCIENCE, now are you?”
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u/CuckBuster33 7h ago
and the comments are usually full of people seething about the outcome of a study instead of identifying any flaws with it
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u/danbinglover 6h ago
Reddit can’t decide whether IQ matters or not. When we talk about IQ differences between different countries and whatnot, it’s racist. When you discuss IQ differences between religious and nonreligious people, somehow it matters again.
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u/KevineCove 3h ago
What I've heard is that IQ simultaneously measures cognition as well as how acclimated you are to Western culture. Additionally, the old school of thought was that there was a kind of intelligence that was innate and unchanging, and that administering an IQ test properly should yield the same result (this isn't really the case.)
It seems likely to me that IQ is lower in some areas on the basis that people there are bad at test-taking, and also in cultures where critical thinking is actively suppressed, because the test ends up measuring both of these variables.
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u/MinusBear 7h ago
An important part of religion is cognitive dissonance. A lot of scriptures don't make sense together and contradict each other. So you have to have a mindset of being sure about something now, while acknowledging you'll solve the discrepancy later. Some of those contradictions are false positives, meaning they only seem like a contradiction until you have more knowledge. Others are actual contradictions. But since some were solved by waiting then surely all can be.
And so you make peace with cognitive dissonance. You're unbothered by it.
Then you apply this principle to everything else in your life. And so you don't have to understand almost anything, least not if you don't bother to look into it more, all while being sure about what you do believe to be true. This is why these people aren't swayed by facts or reasoning in small doses. The facts and reasons are just new information being poured into the swirl of things they don't understand, and they're not as worried about believing things that are wrong. They deal with that all the time.
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