Prefrontal brain lesions reveal magical ideation arises from enhanced religious experiences.

摘要: Magical ideation refers to beliefs about causality that lack empirical bases. Few studies have investigated the neural correlates of magical thinking and religious beliefs. Here, we investigate association between experience in a sample Vietnam veterans who sustained penetrating traumatic brain injury (pTBI) matched healthy controls (HCs). Scores on Ideation Scale were positively correlated with scores Religious Experience Scale, but only pTBI patients. Lesion mapping analyses subgroups patients indicated prefrontal cortex (PFC) lesions associated increased this relationship was mediated by experience. Our findings clarify mechanism which frontal lobe processes modulate Suppression PFC opens people experiences, turn increases ideation.