Cognitive science of religion

The cognitive science of religion is an interdisciplinary field of research which examines religion from a cognitive science perspective. It seeks to explain why religious ways of thinking and actions are distributed universally, and why religious phenomena have characteristic features.

The cognitive science of religion was established in 1975 from a research funding program of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, which for years providing money to support the merging of theoretical approaches in artificial intelligence, psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, anthropology and philosophy.

Significant research centers of the cognitive science of religion are the Institute of Cognition and Culture at Queen's University of Belfast, the department Religion, Cognition and Culture, Aarhus University and the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies of the University of Helsinki.