Breaking magic: Foreign language suppresses superstition

Author:

Hadjichristidis Constantinos12,Geipel Janet3,Surian Luca4

Affiliation:

1. Department of Economics and Management, University of Trento, Trento, Italy

2. Centre for Decision Research, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

3. Department of Public and Occupational Health, VU University Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

4. Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Trento, Italy

Abstract

In three studies, we found that reading information in a foreign language can suppress common superstitious beliefs. Participants read scenarios in either their native or a foreign language. In each scenario, participants were asked to imagine performing an action (e.g., submitting a job application) under a superstitious circumstance (e.g., broken mirror, four-leaf clover) and to rate how they would feel. Overall, foreign language prompted less negative feelings towards bad-luck scenarios and less positive feelings towards good-luck scenarios, while it exerted no influence on non-superstitious, control scenarios. We attribute these findings to language-dependent memory. Superstitious beliefs are typically acquired and used in contexts involving the native language. As a result, the native language evokes them more forcefully than a foreign language.

Publisher

SAGE Publications

Subject

Physiology (medical),General Psychology,Experimental and Cognitive Psychology,General Medicine,Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology,Physiology

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