The DOI matches its Crossref record; 32 of the 32 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Conceptualizing a Nonnatural Entity: Anthropomorphism in God Concepts
Open accessAbstract
We investigate the problem of how nonnatural entities are represented by examining university students' concepts of God, both professed theological beliefs and concepts used in comprehension of narratives. In three story processing tasks, subjects often used an anthropomorphic God concept that is inconsistent with stated theological beliefs; and drastically distorted the narratives without any awareness of doing so. By heightening subjects' awareness of their theological beliefs, we were able to manipulate the degree of anthropomorphization. This tendency to anthropomorphize may be generalizable to other agents. God (and possibly other agents) is unintentionally anthropomorphized in some contexts, perhaps as a means of representing poorly understood nonnatural entities.
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“In a similar fashion, minds never free themselves entirely from their mortal coil: the dead continue to be imagined as possessing ethereal bodies resembling those they ' possessed ' in life, as well as being subject to the sorts of physical limitations typically imposed by bodies. 39”
From Body and Mind in Early China: An Integrated Humanities–Science Approach (2013) · cites this paper as Barrett 1996
In the citing paper
“In a similar fashion, minds never free themselves entirely from their mortal coil: the dead continue to be imagined as possessing ethereal bodies resembling those they ' possessed ' in life, as well as being subject to the sorts of physical limitations typically imposed by bodies. 39”
From Body and Mind in Early China: An Integrated Humanities–Science Approach (2013) · cites this paper as Barrett and Keil 1996
Citations
Cites
Nagel, T. (1974) · The Philosophical Review · doi:10.2307/2183914 · Cited by 7,440
(1927) · Medical Entomology and Zoology · Cited by 1,656
Mental leaps: analogy in creative thought
(1995) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.32-6192 · Cited by 1,607
Mapping the Mind: Domain Specificity In Cognition And Culture
Hirschfeld, L. A., & Gelman, S. A. (1994) · Cited by 1,363
Structured Imagination: the Role of Category Structure in Exemplar Generation
Ward, T. B. (1994) · Cognitive Psychology · doi:10.1006/cogp.1994.1010 · Cited by 828 · cited 1×
“Similarly, the results of these studies could be understood as a case of structured imagination ( Ward, 1994; 1995 ).”
Result(1993) · Cited by 775
The modularity of thought and the epidemiology of representations
Sperber, D. (1994) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511752902.003 · Cited by 695
Domain-specific knowledge and conceptual change
Carey, S. E., & Spelke, E. S. (1994) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511752902.008 · Cited by 675
The Naturalness of Religious Ideas: A Cognitive Theory of Religion
Barrett, J. L., & Boyer, P. (1996) · Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion · doi:10.2307/1386422 · Cited by 541
Self-citationH., M. T. (1992) · Medical Entomology and Zoology · Cited by 525
God Image as a Function of Self-Esteem and Locus of Control
Benson, P., & Spilka, B. (1973) · Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion · doi:10.2307/1384430 · Cited by 432 · cited 1×
“Benson and Spilka (1973) reported a positive correlation between self-esteem and loving images of God.”
BackgroundGorsuch, R. L. (1988) · Annual Review of Psychology · doi:10.1146/annurev.ps.39.020188.001221 · Cited by 401
Bransford, J. D., & McCarrell, N. S. (1974) · Cited by 206
The Naturalness of Religious Ideas: A Cognitive Theory of Religion.
Gardner, D., & Boyer, P. (1995) · Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute · doi:10.2307/3034712 · Cited by 204
Faces in the Clouds: A New Theory of Religion
McCutcheon, R. T., & Guthrie, S. E. (1994) · Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion · doi:10.2307/1386639 · Cited by 200
Anthropomorphism and mechanomorphism: Two faces of the human machine
Caporael, L. R. (1986) · Computers in Human Behavior · doi:10.1016/0747-5632(86)90004-x · Cited by 153 · cited 1×
“derstood agents are treated in this way (Caporael, 1986), since well-understood agents have firm enough representations to make the use of an anthropomorphic concept as a default schema unnecessary.”
BackgroundA Quick Compact Two Sample Test To Duckworth's Specifications
Tukey, J. W. (1959) · Technometrics · doi:10.1080/00401706.1959.10489847 · Cited by 143 · cited 1×
“The difference between the groups was significant as measured by a Tukey–Duckworth test, T Å 7, p õ .025 (Tukey, 1959; Gans, 1981).”
MethodOn a Cognitive Theory of Religion
Bourdillon, M. F. C., de Mahieu, W., Sahay, K., Dutari, J. T., & Guthrie, S. E. (1980) · Current Anthropology · doi:10.1086/202517 · Cited by 117
Sommers, F. (1963) · The Philosophical Review · doi:10.2307/2183167 · Cited by 106 · cited 1×
“Our notions of what sorts of things there are, that is, our ontological knowledge, may undergird in largely implicit ways much of how we categorize and make sense of the world (Sommers, 1963; Keil, 1979).”
BackgroundBaer, S. H. (1995) · Public Relations Review · doi:10.1016/0363-8111(95)90124-8 · Cited by 95
Religiousness: Its Relation to Loneliness, Neuroticism and Subjective Well-Being
Schwab, R., & Petersen, K. U. (1990) · Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion · doi:10.2307/1386462 · Cited by 86
A Dictionary of Comparative Religion
Hein, N., & Brandon, S. G. F. (1972) · Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion · doi:10.2307/1384561 · Cited by 66 · cited 1×
“Perhaps the tendency to anthropomorphize God cannot be resisted because it inevitably follows from a human necessity to conceive of deity in terms of natural categories (Brandon, 1970).”
BackgroundReformational Theology: A New Paradigm for Doing Dogmatics
Spykman, G. J. (1992) · Cited by 63
Justice, W. G., & Lambert, W. E. (1986) · Journal of Pastoral Care · doi:10.1177/002234098604000210 · Cited by 51
Parental Trait Influence on God as an Object Representation
Birky, I. T., & Ball, S. A. (1988) · The Journal of Psychology · doi:10.1080/00223980.1988.9712698 · Cited by 49 · cited 1×
“Since Freud, other authors have suggested similarities between God concepts and images of a parent (Argyle, 1975), both parents in conjunction (Justice & Lambert, 1986; Birky & Ball, 1988), or of the self (Jolley & Taulbee, 1986).”
BackgroundJewish Theology: Systematically and Historically Considered
Kohler, K. (2007) · Cited by 41
God as a father‐projection: the theory and the evidence
Beit‐Hallahmi, B., & Argyle, M. (1975) · British Journal of Medical Psychology · doi:10.1111/j.2044-8341.1975.tb02310.x · Cited by 36
Perceptions of God among Persons with Mental Retardation: A Research Note
Bassett, R. L., Perry, K., Repass, R., Silver, E., & Welch, T. (1994) · Journal of Psychology and Theology · doi:10.1177/009164719402200105 · Cited by 21 · cited 1×
“One study has even noted a shift from anthropomorphic to symbolic representations of God depending upon the level of mental impairment (Bassett et al., 1994).”
BackgroundAssessing Perceptions of Self and God: Comparison of Prisoners and Normals
Jolley, J. C., & Taulbee, S. J. (1986) · Psychological Reports · doi:10.2466/pr0.1986.59.3.1139 · Cited by 19 · cited 1×
“Since Freud, other authors have suggested similarities between God concepts and images of a parent (Argyle, 1975), both parents in conjunction (Justice & Lambert, 1986; Birky & Ball, 1988), or of the self (Jolley & Taulbee, 1986).”
BackgroundCorrected and Extended Tables for Tukey's Quick Test
Gans, D. J. (1981) · Technometrics · doi:10.1080/00401706.1981.10486265 · Cited by 12
The Teaching of the Catholic Church
McCabe, H. (1985) · Cited by 9
Ziaullah, M. (1999) · Cited by 5
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
On seeing human: A three-factor theory of anthropomorphism
Epley, N., Waytz, A., & Cacioppo, J. T. (2007) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.114.4.864 · Cited by 4,069
“…of God tend to match these beliefs, but their more informal descriptions of God's actual behavior show strong evidence of anthropomorphism, with God moving from one place to another, answering prayers in a serial fashion, or being unaware of certain events in the world (J. L. Barrett & Keil, 1996).”
BackgroundWho Sees Human?: The Stability and Importance of Individual Differences in Anthropomorphism
Waytz, A., Cacioppo, J., & Epley, N. (2010) · Perspectives on Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/1745691610369336 · Cited by 1,228
“Measures have ranged from explicit questions about how much an agent looks or acts human (Kiesler & Goetz, 2002) to implicit measures of memory mistakes in which people recall supernatural agents behaving in humanlike ways (Barrett & Keil, 1996).”
BackgroundThe cultural evolution of prosocial religions
Norenzayan, A., Shariff, A. F., Gervais, W. M., Willard, A. K., McNamara, R. A., Slingerland, E., & Henrich, J. (2016) · Behavioral and Brain Sciences · doi:10.1017/s0140525x14001356 · Cited by 934
Destination Personality: An Application of Brand Personality to Tourism Destinations
Ekinci, Y., & Hosany, S. (2006) · Journal of Travel Research · doi:10.1177/0047287506291603 · Cited by 815
Folk biology and the anthropology of science: Cognitive universals and cultural particulars
Scott Atran, B. (1998) · Behavioral and Brain Sciences · doi:10.1017/s0140525x98001277 · Cited by 732
Metadata
- Authors
- Barrett, J. L., & Keil, F. C.
- Affiliations
- Cornell University (US)
- Venue
- Cognitive Psychology
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 1996-12
- Volume
- 31
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 219-247
- ISSN
- 0010-0285 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2166757416
- Cited by
- 769
- References
- 32
- Citations by year
- 2026: 14 · 2025: 33 · 2024: 20 · 2023: 37 · 2022: 30 · 2021: 35 · 2020: 84 · 2019: 48 · 2018: 29 · 2017: 22 · 2016: 29 · 2015: 26 · 2014: 32 · 2013: 25 · 2012: 23
- FWCI
- 7.97
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Cognitive Psychology (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Oxford University Research Archive (ORA) (University of Oxford) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01-HD23922, R01HD023922)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Linguistics and Language › Language, Metaphor, and Cognition
- Social Sciences › Health › Religion, Spirituality, and Psychology
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Philosophy › Study and Philosophy of Religion
- Keywords
- anthropomorphism, concept of God, theological beliefs, narrative comprehension
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Adult, Analysis of Variance, Cognition, Concept Formation, Culture, Humans, Mental Recall, Religion and Psychology, Metaphor, Intuition
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
