Religion and Psychiatry in the Age of Neuroscience

J Nerv Ment Dis. 2020 Jul;208(7):517-523. doi: 10.1097/NMD.0000000000001149.

Abstract

In recent decades, an evolving conversation among religion, psychiatry, and neuroscience has been taking place, transforming how we conceptualize religion and how that conceptualization affects its relation to psychiatry. In this article, we review several dimensions of the dialogue, beginning with its history and the phenomenology of religious experience. We then turn to neuroscientific studies to see how they explain religious experience, and we follow that with two related areas: the benefits of religious beliefs and practices, and the evolutionary foundation of those benefits. A final section addresses neuroscientific and evolutionary accounts of the transcendent, that is, what these fields make of the claim that religious experience connects to a transcendent reality. We conclude with a brief summary, along with the unresolved questions we have encountered.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
  • Review

MeSH terms

  • Humans
  • Mental Disorders / therapy*
  • Neurosciences*
  • Psychiatry / methods*
  • Psychotherapy / methods*
  • Religion and Psychology*
  • Spirituality