Measuring superstitious belief: Why lucky charms matter

By Richard Wiseman, Caroline Watt. 2004

198 citations recorded by the source corpus.

A large body of research has attempted to develop theories about the function and origin of superstitious beliefs on the basis of the psychological correlates of such beliefs. Most of this work has measured superstitious belief using the Paranormal Belief Scale (PBS), and has tended to find that superstitious belief is associated with poor psychological adjustment such as low self-efficacy and high trait anxiety. However, the PBS refers solely to negative superstitions (e.g., breaking a mirror will cause bad luck) and omits items referring to positive superstitions (e.g., carrying a lucky charm will bring good luck). Positive superstitions may serve different psychological functions to negative superstitions. Indeed, as with other forms of “positive illusions”, beliefs in positive superstitions may be psychologically adaptive. This paper reports two studies investigating this neglected aspect of the psychological correlates of superstitious belief. If positive and negative superstitious beliefs serve different psychological functions, then we might expect, using Analysis of Variance, to find interactions between superstition type, and various relevant individual difference measures. Study 1 was a large-scale Internet-based study which investigated the relationship between endorsement of superstition type, gender, and a single-item measure of neuroticism. Participants were asked to indicate the degree to which they endorsed three negative and three positive superstitious beliefs using five response options (anchored with Definitely Yes and Definitely No). The three negative items were: “Have you avoided walking under a ladder because it is associated with bad luck?”; “Would you be anxious about breaking a mirror because it is thought to cause bad luck?”; and, “Are you superstitious about the number 13?”. The three positive items were: “Do you say ‘fingers crossed’ or actually cross your fingers?”; “Do you say ‘touch wood’ or actually touch or knock on wood”; and, “Do you sometimes carry a lucky charm or object?”. 4,339 individuals took part in study 1. The highly statistically significant results found interactions between gender and endorsement of superstition type, and between neuroticism and superstition type. Study 2 was conducted by mail, and sought to replicate and extend the findings obtained in Study 1 by administering validated questionnaire measures of neuroticism and life satisfaction alongside positive and negative superstition items. 116 individuals took part. As with study 1, there was a significant interaction between gender and superstition type, but no interaction was found for neuroticism. A significant interaction was found between superstition type and life satisfaction. Overall, these findings indicate that the psychological correlates of superstitious belief vary depending on whether the belief is in positive or negative superstitions. These findings have important implications for theory development, demonstrate that the PBS is an incomplete measure of superstitious belief, and highlight the need for future measures to include items referring to positive superstitions.

Subfields: Health, Social Psychology, Philosophy

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/4ae7b029466108f533d26161b24233c295ae2c58

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Citations in the corpus

Paranormal beliefs: their dimensionality and correlates (2006, background): “…arguments, prior studies have shown that emotional instability, for example neuroticism and anxiety, is related to an increase in superstitiousness (Wiseman & Watt, 2004; Zebb & Moore, 2003), and that negative life events, like times of threat, increase interest in astrology (Padgett & Jorgenson,…”
Conscious and Nonconscious Components of Superstitious Beliefs in Judgment and Decision Making (2008, background): “Colors and numbers (e.g., the number 4 and the color black) are also associated with unlucky consequences (Wiseman and Watt 2004).”
What's in a Term? Paranormal, Superstitious, Magical and Supernatural Beliefs by Any Other Name Would Mean the Same (2012, background): “Some others connected three of the four concepts together, be they paranormal, superstitions, and supernatural (Otis & Alcock, 1982), paranormal, superstitions, and magical (Schulter & Papousek, 2008), or superstitions, magical, and supernatural (Gbadamosi, 2005; Wiseman & Watt, 2004).”
Beyond confidence: Development of a measure assessing the 5C psychological antecedents of vaccination (2018, background): “This should also be associated with a more deliberative cognitive style of decision making [51] and less irrational thinking (superstitious beliefs; [52]).”