TY - JOUR

T1 - The hand of God or the hand of Maradona? Believing in free will increases perceived intentionality of others’ behavior

AU - Genschow, Oliver

AU - Rigoni, Davide

AU - Brass, Marcel

N1 - Funding Information: This research was partially funded by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation’s Philosophy and Science of Self-Control Project ( 15462 ). Publisher Copyright: © 2019 Elsevier Inc.

PY - 2019/4/1

Y1 - 2019/4/1

N2 - The question of whether free will actually exists has been debated in philosophy for centuries. However, how belief in free will shapes the perception of our social environment still remains open. Here we investigate whether belief in free will affects how much intentionality we attribute to other people. Study 1a and 1b demonstrate a weak positive relation between the strength of belief in free will and the perceived intentionality of soccer players committing handball. This pattern even holds for behavior that is objectively not intentional (i.e., when the player touches the ball accidentally). Going one step further, in Study 2 we find a weak correlation between belief in free will and perceiving intentions in very abstract geometrical shapes. These findings suggest that whether individuals believe in free will or not changes the way they interpret others’ behavior, which may have important societal consequences.

AB - The question of whether free will actually exists has been debated in philosophy for centuries. However, how belief in free will shapes the perception of our social environment still remains open. Here we investigate whether belief in free will affects how much intentionality we attribute to other people. Study 1a and 1b demonstrate a weak positive relation between the strength of belief in free will and the perceived intentionality of soccer players committing handball. This pattern even holds for behavior that is objectively not intentional (i.e., when the player touches the ball accidentally). Going one step further, in Study 2 we find a weak correlation between belief in free will and perceiving intentions in very abstract geometrical shapes. These findings suggest that whether individuals believe in free will or not changes the way they interpret others’ behavior, which may have important societal consequences.

KW - Belief in free will

KW - Intention attribution

KW - Interpersonal perception

KW - Business psychology

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85062492951&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/j.concog.2019.02.004

DO - 10.1016/j.concog.2019.02.004

M3 - Journal articles

C2 - 30856544

AN - SCOPUS:85062492951

VL - 70

SP - 80

EP - 87

JO - Consciousness and Cognition

JF - Consciousness and Cognition

SN - 1053-8100

ER -