Scott Alexander examines a failed replication of a study claiming analytical thinking promotes religious disbelief, and discusses the broader implications for understanding the relationship between thinking styles and religious belief.
Longer summary
Scott Alexander reviews a study by Gervais and Norenzayan (G&N) that claimed analytical thinking promotes religious disbelief, and its subsequent failed replication attempts. The original study consisted of five experiments, including priming participants with images or word tasks before assessing their religious beliefs. The Reproducibility Project's replication of two of these experiments failed to find the same effects. Scott discusses the implications of this failure, noting that even studies that seem well-designed can fail to replicate. He then examines a meta-analysis by Pennycook et al. that found a small but consistent correlation between analytical thinking and irreligiosity across multiple studies. Scott concludes by summarizing key takeaways about the relationship between analytical thinking, IQ, and religious belief, as well as lessons about the replicability of psychological studies.
Shorter summary