Believing in the purpose of events-why does it occur, and is it supernatural?

What is the cognitive basis for the common belief that random events have a purpose, and are these beliefs a form of supernatural thinking, as Bering has suggested? Two questionnaire studies with Finnish volunteer participants (N = 2650, 1830 females, mean age 26) used structural equation modelling (SEM) to test the hypotheses that beliefs in the purpose of events are part of the same phenomenon as paranormal beliefs and that confusions of core knowledge of the psychological, biological and physical domains predict both sets of beliefs. In Study 1, participants were not given a definition of purpose, and in Study 2, purpose was explicitly defined as entailing planning by a supernatural agent. The results from both studies supported the predictions. The results indicate that construing events in terms of purpose is not a universal tendency but an individual cognitive bias that can be accounted for by false analogies from intuitive psychology, biology and physics. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Language: en