Human dignity – the foundation of political human rights? Empirical research among youth in Germany

This article focuses on political human rights and on the empirically assessed legitimation of these rights. This research considers the rights of refugees, the active and passive right to vote, and the right of protest. Given that the research is empirical research, respondents are requested to express agreement, disagreement or neutrality. The assumption is that contextual factors influence people’s assessment of rights. One contextual factor is, firstly, the concept of human dignity. International human rights covenants regard human dignity as the very foundation of all rights. That said, the concept of human dignity is subject to different understandings and – certainly in the past – the understanding of what constitutes human dignity has varied. Dignity can be related to the appreciation of the person given by others, to the moral behaviour of a person, and it can be understood as inherently related to the individual as a human being. It is this last understanding that forms the basis of modern declarations of human rights. Furthermore, the respondents’ value orientations and religious beliefs, along with society’s socio-political perception, will be examined to ascertain whether these factors have any influence on respondents’ attitudes towards political rights. The key question is: does human dignity influence people’s view of the legitimacy of political rights and do other factors also count? The empirical analysis was undertaken done with German youth (N=2244). Findings show that the concept of inherent human dignity is a strong predictor for respondents’ attitudes towards political rights, but that it is not the unique predictor; relevant concepts are the value orientation of youth and their socio-political orientation. The significance of religious beliefs as a predictor is low.     

Relationship between religious belief and happiness in Oman: a statistical analysis

This paper explores the relationship between religiosity and happiness among the multicultural people in Oman. A sample of 335 respondents from all walks of life in Oman was analysed using the mean happiness value and their religiousness, religion, age, education level and nationality. The findings were verified using regression and correlation analysis. It was observed that regardless of the religious belief, the level of happiness among people increases with the increasing level of religiousness. The findings could be useful not only to the general public, but also to psychologist and mental health professionals. People with depression, suicidal tendencies, low self-esteem and so on may possibly be treated with religious practices and activities. If such techniques show effectiveness, they may help to bring improvements in mental health and well-being treatments. One unique aspect of this study is that the sample consisted of people from various nationalities, religions and cultural backgrounds living in Oman.     

SOBIG: A Symposium on Belief in God

The following is a fictional account of a symposium on the age-old topic of belief in God. Organized by faculty members at a religion-based academy called the “Immutable Creeds University” (ICU), the goal of the Symposium was to generate candid discussion on two major questions of interest to both traditional theology and the contemporary cognitive sciences: (1) Why do people believe in God? and (2) Is that belief justified? Responses to these questions were posed and discussed by representatives of: (a) Pre-scientific creedal Christianity, (b) Scientifically informed Christian theology, and (c) Comprehensive naturalism. These three points of view also represent the succession of stages experienced by the author in his personal (and occasionally turbulent) worldview journey. For this reason, some readers may wish to read the author's closing remarks first.     

Looking Back,Looking Forward: ISPP at 40 and Future Directions for Political Psychology

The ISPP Presidential Address typically is an opportunity for the President to outline his or her research contribution and trajectory, and the publication of the Address takes the form of a research article. Given that in 2017, ISPP celebrated its 40th conference and 2018 is its 40th anniversary as an academic society, the 2017 Presidential Address and this article are focused on the state of the Society; What have we achieved? How have we changed? Where are we heading? Looking back, ISPP is a more diverse and international society than in 1978, and it is confidently fulfilling its mission. Looking forward, three areas that warrant further attention are outlined: (1) The issue of a possible decline in scientific rationalism and threat of anti‐liberalism (2) challenges with measurement and prediction of political opinion, political attitudes, and voting behavior, and (3) as a maturing field, the need to establish common theoretical frameworks that integrate current knowledge such as building a case that humans are political animals. Each direction is briefly outlined with the aim of provoking thought and stimulating discussion and debate about the future of political psychology.     

Teleology and the intentions of supernatural agents

Teleological beliefs about the natural world often exist implicitly, and there is a positive relationship between teleological endorsement and belief in supernatural agents. In the current study, participants judged a series of scientifically unwarranted teleological explanations of biological organisms and natural non-living objects, under speeded or un-speeded instructions. After controlling for belief in the existence of supernatural agents, rates of implicit (speeded) and explicit (un-speeded) teleological endorsement were moderated by the belief that supernatural agents intentionally interact with the world. Amongst non-religious individuals, rates of implicit endorsement were significantly higher than explicit endorsement, whereas for highly religious individuals the difference was non-significant. This interaction was driven predominantly by explanations of natural non-living objects. These results are consistent with an intention-based theory of teleology, and help to reconcile the finding of a positive relationship between teleological endorsement and belief in supernatural agents, with the those of an enduring teleological bias.     

If You Can't Change What You Believe,You Don't Believe It

I develop and defend the view that subjects are necessarily psychologically able to revise their beliefs in response to relevant counter-evidence. Specifically, subjects can revise their beliefs in response to relevant counter-evidence, given their current psychological mechanisms and skills. If a subject lacks this ability, then the mental state in question is not a belief, though it may be some other kind of cognitive attitude, such as a supposition, an entertained thought, or a pretense. The result is a moderately revisionary view of belief: while most mental states we thought were beliefs are beliefs, some mental states which we thought were beliefs are not beliefs. The argument for this view draws on two key claims: First, subjects are rationally obligated to revise their beliefs in response to relevant counter-evidence. Second, if some subject is rationally obligated to revise one of her mental states, then that subject can revise that mental state, given her current psychological mechanisms and skills. Along the way to defending these claims, I argue that rational obligations can govern activities which reflect on one's rational character, whether or not those activities are under one's voluntary control. I also show how the relevant version of epistemic ‘ought’ implies ‘can’ survives an objection which plagues other variants of the principle.     

Belief in Supernatural Evil and Mental Health: Do Secure Attachment to God and Gender Matter?

This study examines whether belief in supernatural evil is associated with mental health. In addition, it assesses how secure attachment to God moderates this association and how gender conditions the moderating effect of secure attachment to God. Among a variety of mental health outcomes, this study focuses on general mental health problems as well as anxiety-related disorders (e.g., general anxiety, social anxiety, and paranoia). Using data from the 2010 Baylor Religion Survey (N = 1,627), the analyses reveal that belief in supernatural evil is positively associated with general anxiety and paranoia. In addition, secure attachment to God buffers the positive associations between belief in supernatural evil and social anxiety and paranoia. Yet, when general mental health problems and general anxiety serve as the outcome measures, secure attachment to God attenuates the positive associations of belief in supernatural evil with mental health only for women, but not men. These results underscore the ways that religious beliefs have both positive and negative implications for mental health. Furthermore, they highlight the importance of gender in the complex relationships between religious beliefs and mental health.     

Development of the Japanese Version of the Generic Conspiracist Beliefs Scale (GCBS-J)

Generic conspiracist belief refers to the general tendency toward conspiracist ideation independent of specific event-based conspiracy theories. The present research aimed to develop a Japanese version of the Generic Conspiracist Beliefs Scale (GCBS-J). In two studies, we examined the factor structure, reliability, and convergent and discriminant validity of the GCBS-J. In Study 1 (N = 600), exploratory factor analysis with a split-half subsample proposed a two-factor solution dissociating extraterrestrial conspiracy from other conspiracist ideations. Subsequent confirmatory factor analysis with the other split-half subsample confirmed the two-factor structure. Study 1 also established convergent validity by indicating strong positive correlations with other measures of conspiracist belief. Study 2 (N = 178) added further evidence to indicate a positive correlation with related psychological constructs, such as paranormal beliefs. Study 2 also confirmed temporal test–retest reliability and the discriminant validity of the GCBS-J by indicating no association with an unrelated construct, namely Big-Five personality traits. These findings suggest that the GCBS-J is a useful tool for assessing generic conspiracist beliefs within Japanese samples.     

Moral philosophy's moral risk

Commonsense moral thinking holds that people have doxastic, contemplative, and expressive duties, that is, duties to or not to believe, seriously consider, and express certain ideas. This paper argues that moral and political philosophers face a high risk of violating any such duties, both because of the sensitivity and difficult of the subject matter, and because of various pernicious biases and influences philosophers face. We argue this leads to a dilemma, which we will not try to solve. Either philosophers should reduce their risk by avoiding sensitive issues where they are likely to violate such duties or, for one reason or another, philosophers are to some degree exempt from such duties when doing their work. Either horn of the dilemma, we argue, has unpalatable implications.