Problems for the cognitive-depletion model of religious interactions

Abstract

Schoejdt, Sorensen, Nielbo, Xygalatas, Mitkidis and Bulbulia put forward a new cognitive model of religious interactions, which we depict in Figure one. The model stresses three common features of such interactions: the requirement to suppress emotion expression, the exposure to ritualized behavior and the presence of a charismatic authority (1). These features have different cognitive effects involving different sorts of cognitive-resource depletion (2). The regulation of emotion expression drives one’s attention to inward phenomena, compromising one’s ability to form episodic memories of the external, observable aspects of rituals. Ritualized behavior precludes the ordinary, means-end analysis of action and demands low-level action parsing. These two effects impede the interpretation of ritualized behavior or other observable aspects of rituals (3), which makes one susceptible to authoritative interpretive discourses (4), which in turn promote collective religious-symbolic interpretations (5). The presence of a charismatic authority has a third cognitive effect involving cognitive-resource depletion—lack of error monitoring concerning the evidence disconfirming an authoritative interpretation. Since a charismatic authority is an authority, it can play two roles: a conjoint one, by adding another force for the establishment of collective religious-symbolic interpretations (4-1→2→5); an independent one, by persuading individuals to align their interpretations of a ritual with the authoritative one (1→2→5). Thus, via cognitive-resource depletion, the three features contribute to the same effect, which constitutes their social function—to