Abstract
Humans have a tendency to endorse teleological beliefs about the world. According to terror management theory, teleological or purposeful beliefs about the world help people cope with the awareness of mortality. Though research is generally consistent with this assertion, it has not been directly tested. Three studies tested and supported the notion that teleological beliefs about the world serve a terror management function. In “Study 1”, experimentally elevated teleological beliefs reduced death-thought accessibility. In “Studies 2 and 3”, mortality salience increased teleological beliefs, even if this resulted in judgment errors. Alternative explanations were tested and did not account for the findings.
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Notes
Overall and within-cell correlation analyses revealed that participants’ ratings on the believability of these statements were not correlated with DTA (ps >.65) and these ratings did not moderate the effect of the manipulation on DTA.
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Davis, W.E., Juhl, J. & Routledge, C. Death and design: The terror management function of teleological beliefs. Motiv Emot 35, 98–104 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-010-9193-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-010-9193-6