Quote:
Originally Posted by Zeromajor Don't swing doors, don't walk under ladders, ooh a black cat, mind those cracks....
If we think about it, wouldn't a psychologist consider behaviour like this to be some level of high-functioning autism?
It's always intrigued me how perfectly reasonable, logical individuals can turn into irrational lunatics over things like the above in this day and age. Note: This isn't about religion, so don't go there  |
Working hard in the new job I see mate
Did this back in my A level days of psychology, we did something about Pigeons being supersticious or something like that.
When talking about superstition you have to rule out certain things...
For example, you have compulsion, like counting things etc (OCD for example) which again is sometimes linked into superstitions if you've seen the movie As Good As It Gets, you will see Jack Nicholson with signs of superstition, stepping over cracks and eating at the same table, this is just purely OCD, not to be confused with superstitions.
Anxiety is another thing which can lead to compulsion and superstious tendancies.
Procedure/Ritual... often a part of a sports person/athlete's usual procedure before a race/event etc, which is used to help keep the person composed so they can perform without feeling the pressure, the fact they have the same procedure each time they do this can be seen as parly superstitious but more so just as a methodology for keeping themself composed.
I think the whole superstition thing is a mix of many things, and probably has a bit of a placebo effect, someone who doesn't walk under a ladder doesn't have something bad happen to them... thus it must be working.
There's a number of things to look at on the whole superstition front as to what causes the tendancies.