In June 2017 the Understanding Unbelief programme awarded funding to 11 project teams. Their diverse projects will explore unbelief from a number of different disciplinary perspectives, including psychology, sociology, anthropology and religious studies. They will investigate unbelief in over 30 countries, working across a wide array of religious and cultural contexts. Participants in the studies will include under-researched populations such as children and young people; people at end of life; BME ‘unbelievers’; and non-Western ‘unbelievers’.
Follow the links below to learn more about the projects.
Origin and Maintenance of Unbelief in a Believing World
PIs: Professor Jamin Halberstadt, Psychology and Associate Professor Jesse Bering, Psychology, University of Otago, New Zealand
Reaching for a New Sense of Connection? Towards a Deeper Understanding of the Sociality of Generation Y Non-believers in Northern and Central Europe
PI: Professor David Herbert, Sociology, University of Kingston, London, UK
Mapping the Psychology of Unbelief Across Contexts and Cultures
PI: Dr Jonathan Jong, Psychology, Coventry University, UK
Magical Thinking in Contexts and Situations of Unbelief
PIs: Dr Theodoros Kyriakides, Anthropology and Dr Richard Irvine, Anthropology, Open University, UK
Uncovering the Hidden Nature of Unbelief
PI: Dr Marjaana Lindeman, Psychology, University of Helsinki, Finland
Meaning Making Narratives Among Non-Religious Individuals Facing the End of Life
PI: Dr Christel Manning, Religious Studies, Sacred Heart University, USA
Mindfulness Meditation: A Secular Religion for Unbelievers?
PI: Dr Masoumeh Rahmani, Religious Studies, Coventry University, UK
Understanding Unbelief in Secular Social Action: Doing Whose Work?
PI: Dr Timothy Stacey, Religious Studies, University of Ottawa, Canada
The Amoral Atheist? A Cross-cultural Examination of Cognitive, Motivational, and Cultural Contributions to Unbelief and Moral Considerations
PI: Dr Tomas Ståhl, Psychology, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA
Nonreligious Childhood: Growing Up Unbelieving in Contemporary Britain
PI: Dr Anna Strhan, Religious Studies, University of Kent, UK
Understanding Unbelief in Egypt
PI: Dr Karin van Nieuwkerk, Anthropology, Radboud University, The Netherlands