Research done at Queen’s University in Belfast by the psychologists Bethany Heywood and Jesse Bering found that British atheists were just as likely as American atheists to believe that their life events had underlying purposes, even though Britain is far less religious than America. These atheists’ responses weren’t just the product of living in America’s highly religious society. But many atheists did so as well, and a majority of atheists in a related study also said that they believed in fate - defined as the view that life events happen for a reason and that there is an underlying order to life that determines how events turn out. Unsurprisingly, a majority of religious believers said they thought that these events happened for a reason and that they had been purposefully designed (presumably by God).
THINGS HAPPEN FOR A REASON SERIES
In one series of studies, recently published in the journal Cognition, we asked people to reflect on significant events from their own lives, such as graduations, the births of children, falling in love, the deaths of loved ones and serious illnesses. Where does this belief come from? One theory is that it reflects religious teachings - we think that events have meaning because we believe in a God that plans for us, sends us messages, rewards the good and punishes the bad.īut research from the Yale Mind and Development Lab, where we work, suggests that this can’t be the whole story. As the phrase goes, everything happens for a reason. People regularly do so for both terrible incidents, such as being injured in an explosion, and positive ones, like being cured of a serious disease. Costello is not alone in finding meaning in life events. “It was to meet my best friend, and the love of my life.” “I now realize why I was involved in the tragedy,” he wrote. Costello posted a picture of the ring on Facebook. Costello developed a relationship with one of his nurses, Krista D’Agostino, and they soon became engaged.
During the months of surgery and rehabilitation that followed, Mr. ON April 15, 2013, James Costello was cheering on a friend near the finish line at the Boston Marathon when the bombs exploded, severely burning his arms and legs and sending shrapnel into his flesh.