Nowe spojrzenie na mózgowe podłoże religijności : wnioski z mapowania sieci lezji

The temporal lobe has been suggested as a potential locus for religious feelings and mystical experiences by a large body of previous research. However, Ferguson and colleagues have recently shed new light on the neural basis of religiosity and spirituality. In the study published in 2022 in Biological Psychiatry, they used an analytical method called lesion network mapping. This innovative technique allows mapping complex human behaviors to specific cerebral circuits based on the locations of lesions in neurological patients. Analysis was conducted on data from 88 patients who had undergone surgery for a brain tumor and validated on data from 105 veterans of the Vietnam War who had experienced head trauma. The researchers found that religiosity and spirituality can be localized to a specific area of the midbrain, namely the periaqueductal gray. This brainstem region is implicated in many important functions, including pain modulation, fear conditioning, unconditional love, and prosocial behaviors. Thus, the results of Ferguson and colleagues’ study point to the deep roots of religiosity and spirituality in an evolutionarily old part of the brain.