The Psychology of Religion and Place (eBook)

This book examines the role of religious and spiritual experiences in people's understanding of their environment. The contributors consider how understandings and experiences of religious and place connections are motivated by the need to seek and maintain contact with perceptual objects, so as to form meaningful relationship experiences. The volume is one of the first scholarly attempts to discuss the psychological links between place and religious experiences.The chapters within provide insights for understanding how people's experiences with geographical places and the sacred serve as agencies for meaning-making, pro-social behaviour, and psychological adjustment in everyday life.

Victor Counted, PhD, is Research Associate of the Cambridge Institute of Applied Psychology and Religion and teaches at the School of Social Sciences and Psychology, Western Sydney University, Australia.

Fraser Watts, PhD, is Visiting Professor of Psychology of Religion at the University of Lincoln, UK, Executive Secretary of the International Society of Science and Religion and Director of the Cambridge Institute for Applied Psychology and Religion at the University of Cambridge, UK.