A colleague is doing research on mixed emotions across cultures, so this headline caught my eye: “Religious people experience more mixed emotions than non-believers” The website PsyPost summarized (possibly with the help of AI) the empirical research. The original empirical journal article is available here, and might be paywalled.
The study found that people who are more religious experience more mixed emotions. What was the mediator of this relationship?
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Have you ever felt both positive and negative at the same time? That’s a mixed emotion. Why might mixed emotions be more common among religious people? Here’s how PsyPost summarized it:
Some studies indicate that faith boosts positive emotions like gratitude and joy. Other studies suggest it increases negative emotions like guilt or shame. The researchers behind the new study proposed that these perspectives might be missing a third possibility. They hypothesized that religion might provoke both types of feelings simultaneously.
The empirical journal article reported multiple studies. Here is how PsyPost described the first one:
In the first study, the researchers surveyed 321 American adults. They measured “dispositional religiosity,” which refers to a person’s general, stable tendency to be religious. Participants rated their current emotional state on a scale. They indicated if they felt positive emotions like pride, negative emotions like fear, or mixed emotions. The mixed emotions were described as feeling a mix of happiness and sadness.The data revealed a clear pattern. Participants who scored higher on religiosity reported experiencing higher levels of mixed emotions.
a) Sketch a scatterplot of the result described above. As you do, think about the following: About how many dots will it have? What does one dot represent? How will you label your axes?
b) This is a correlational study. Why?
Now let’s talk about mechanism, or mediation. As you learn in Chapter 9, a mediator is a potential reason why two variables are correlated. In this case, the authors wondered why religiosity predicts more mixed emotions. They tested three potential mediators, but only one seemed to be responsible for the relationship. Here’s how PsyPost explains the mediation pattern:
[one] study aimed to uncover the psychological mechanism driving this phenomenon. …. “fear of God.” This concept refers to viewing God as a benevolent protector who also serves as a strict moral judge. The researchers theorized that this simultaneous sense of comfort and fear of punishment could trigger mixed affective states. They surveyed 380 participants and measured [fear of God] alongside religiosity and emotions.
Higher religiosity predicted a greater fear of God. This specific type of fear was strongly associated with experiencing mixed emotions. The researchers suggest that perceiving a supernatural agent who is both loving and punitive creates a complex emotional experience. The believer feels reverence and comfort but also anxiety about moral inadequacy.
c) Following models in the “mediation” section of Chapter 9, sketch, using three boxes and arrows, the mediation hypothesis that is being described here.
d) Three of the religiosity studies were preregistered. What does that mean?
e) Let’s talk about causation. One of the studies in this package measured religiosity at Time 1, and then measured mixed emotions one month later , at Time 2. They found that religiosity did predict more mixed emotions over time. This study, therefore, achieves both covariance and temporal precedence. However, as a correlational study, we can’t definitively rule out third (or “C”) variables. Think of a C variable that might be associated with both higher religiosity and higher levels of mixed emotions. Sketch out your thinking.
What do you think? What’s interesting about this study, and what might you test as a follow up question??