ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on a central topic in the psychology of religion, religious experience. There is a core set of experiences that meet both criteria; experiences that both have a distinctive phenomenology, and also are interpreted in a particular religious way. Religious experience can be seen as 'nothing but' a reflection of personal needs, cultural influence, or brain processes. The cognitive approach to religious experience is, so far, relatively under-developed, though it is currently the focus of active consideration. The social and neuropsychological critiques of religious experience will be evaluated in terms of the developing scientific understanding of human cognition. The chapter suggests that considering what is cognitively plausible helps in finding a sensible path through often polemical debates. It reviews some of the main theories currently being advanced about how brain processes give rise to religious experience. The chapter examines how theories of the cognitive processes subserving religious consciousness might evolve.
