Nonbelievers endorse a variety of beliefs and rationalistic & humanistic worldviews, which may serve compensatory functions; report meaningful & healthy lives; can show limited prejudice toward ideological opponents

The psychology of nonbelievers. Filip Uzarevic, Thomas J. Coleman III. Current Opinion in Psychology, Volume 40, August 2021, Pages 131-138. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2020.08.026

Rolf Degen's take: https://twitter.com/DegenRolf/status/1338068369598242816

Highlights

• Nonbelief relates to open-minded and analytic thinking styles, which likely interacts with cultural influences.

• Nonbelievers endorse a variety of beliefs and worldviews, such as rationalistic and humanistic ideologies that may serve compensatory functions.

• Nonbelievers report meaningful and healthy lives, and the (non)religion-health curvilinear relationship is supported across various contexts.

• Nonbelievers can show prejudice toward ideological opponents, but its scope is contextual and limited.

Abstract: Contrary to some conceptualizations, nonbelievers are more than simply those scoring low on religiosity scales. They seem to be characterized by analytic, flexible, and open-minded social-cognitive attributes, although this may interact with sociocultural levels of religiosity. This paper demonstrates that nonbelief, at least in the West, tends to coincide with specific worldviews, namely valuing rationality and science, as well as humanistic and liberal values. Furthermore, nonbelievers seem to parallel believers in various indicators of health. Finally, as all ideologists, nonbelievers may hold prejudicial attitudes toward groups perceived as threatening their (secular) worldviews, although this has some limits. Global increases in secularity make the nascent psychological study of nonbelievers and nonreligious worldviews an important research programme.