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- Title
An EEG Study on the Effects of Induced Spiritual Experiences on Somatosensory Processing and Sensory Suppression.
- Authors
Van Elk, Michiel
- Abstract
In the present EEG study a placebo God Helmet was used to induce spiritual experiences in the lab, by boosting the expectations and suggestibility of participants. At a behavioral level it was found that instructions regarding whether the helmet was turned on or off were not effective, but that individual differences in magical ideation and absorption were associated with induced spiritual experiences: people scoring high on absorption and magical ideation were more prone to having unusual experiences, which in turn was associated with a stronger belief in the effectiveness of the helmet. At a neural level, believers in the effectiveness of the helmet compared to skeptics were characterized by a trend for increased theta / alpha power during the helmet session and a trend for a reduced auditory suppression of the P2 component. No differences were observed in somatosensory processing between believers and skeptics. These novel findings indicate that individual personality differences are related to self-induced spiritual experiences. The reduced sensory suppression that was found may reflect changes in the pre-reflective sense of agency, which in turn could underlie proneness to self-induced spiritual experiences.
- Subjects
ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPHY; PLACEBOS; SPIRITUALITY; INDIVIDUAL differences; BELIEF &; doubt
- Publication
Journal for the Cognitive Science of Religion, 2014, Vol 2, Issue 2, p121
- ISSN
2049-7555
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1558/jcsr.v2i2.24573