Latest news with #CindelWhite
The Star
5 days ago
- General
- The Star
Do you believe in karma? It plays out differently for ourselves versus others
We tend to think that our happiness is deserved, while other people's misfortunes are the consequence of their actions. — AFP Many people believe in karma, the idea that good deeds attract rewards and bad deeds attract punishment. A Canadian study, published in the journal Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, has examined this belief. It argues that the way we interpret the effects of karma varies according to whether we're talking about our own experiences or those of others. Cindel White, associate professor in the Department of Psychology at York University and her team set out to understand more about people's beliefs in karma. The researchers hypothesise that the need for justice leads us to think that others deserve their misfortunes, while the desire to see ourselves as a good person encourages us to perceive our victories as deserved. It's a way of looking at things that flatter our ego, while at the same time comforting us with the idea that order reigns. To test this idea, researchers conducted several experiments involving over 2,000 particpants In the first, 478 Americans who believed in karma were asked to recount a karmic event they or someone else had experienced. The vast majority (86%) chose to talk about a personal experience, and of these, 59% mentioned a positive event linked, in their opinion, to a good deed. In contrast, 92% of those who told someone else's story mentioned a negative event. A second experiment involved over 1,200 participants from the United States, India and Singapore. They, too, were asked to write about a personal karmic experience or that of someone else. Here again, these figures speak for themselves: 69% of those who wrote about themselves described a positive episode, compared to just 18% of those who wrote about someone else. Even the vocabulary used was more positive in personal accounts. The belief in karma allows people to see other people's suffering as justified retribution. — Freepik Prevalence of positive bias The researchers note that this effect was less marked in participants from India and Singapore. They believe this difference reflects the lesser prevalence of the self-positivity bias in these cultures. 'The positive bias in karmic self-perceptions is a bit weaker in the Indian and Singaporean samples compared with US samples, but across all countries, participants were much more likely to say that other people face karmic punishments while they receive karmic rewards,' explains White in a news release. The study shows how supernatural beliefs can be used strategically. 'Thinking about karma allows people to take personal credit and feel pride in good things that happen to them even when it isn't clear exactly what they did to create the good outcome, but it also allows people to see other people's suffering as justified retribution,' says White. 'This satisfies various personal motives – to see oneself as good and deserving of good fortune, and to see justice in other people's suffering – and supernatural beliefs like karma might be especially good at satisfying these motives when other, more secular explanations fail.' But if karma comforts us, it also acts as a mirror for our biases. By believing that our happiness is deserved, while the misfortunes of others are the consequence of their actions, we nurture a reassuring worldview that is sometimes blind to injustice. This kind of belief speaks volumes about our need for order and merit in a world where chance remains difficult to accept. – AFP Relaxnews
Yahoo
11-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Do bad people have it coming? Study finds most karma believers think so
Get inspired by a weekly roundup on living well, made simple. Sign up for CNN's Life, But Better newsletter for information and tools designed to improve your well-being. When it comes to karma, most people believe the universe is their own personal cheerleader — but an exacting judge for everyone else, according to a new study published May 1 by the American Psychological Association in the journal Psychology of Religion and Spirituality. Researchers asked more than 2,000 people from various religious and nonreligious backgrounds to write about their experiences with karma — the belief that good deeds are rewarded, and bad actions are punished — and a common through-line of their responses emerged. When the participants wrote about themselves, 59% told tales of being rewarded for their good deeds. In their stories about others, 92% chronicled how misfortune befell cheating partners, indebted friends, bullies and lousy coworkers. 'Thinking about karma allows people to take personal credit and feel pride in good things that happen to them even when it isn't clear exactly what they did to create the good outcome,' the study's senior author, Cindel White, said in a statement. 'But it also allows people to see other people's suffering as justified retribution.' The findings offer a window into the way our minds form judgments about ourselves and those around us, said White, an assistant professor at York University in Toronto who studies how psychological motives interact with spirituality. 'I firmly believe in providing charitable donations to those in need, no matter how small,' one anonymous response from the study reads. 'Doing so has benefited me greatly and occasionally has led to individuals doing me favors without asking.' Another reads, 'I knew a guy who was always rude and cruel to everyone; he never did anything nice his entire life. He was diagnosed with cancer, and I just couldn't help but think that was karma.' The study identifies the tendency to see yourself as deserving of good fortune, even in the absence of direct causes, as a form of 'attribution bias,' — a concept which has been studied by psychologists for decades, said Patrick Heck, a research psychologist at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, commenting in his personal capacity. 'Attribution theory and attribution biases are the general idea that people attribute certain things that happen to them or other people in line with ways that make them feel good about themselves,' said Heck, who was not involved in the study. In some ways, attribution bias serves the purpose of promoting self-esteem, which helps people overcome challenges in life, White said. But other times, it could lead people astray when they fail to recognize the contributions of others or the external factors of success. On the other side of the coin, the belief that other people's suffering is a form of punishment comes from a need to believe that the world is just. This belief can help people make sense of the complexity of life, Heck said. '(The world) is full of statistical noise. Random things happen to people all the time. And we know from lots of research in psychology that people struggle to reconcile randomness in their lives,' Heck said. 'It's very compelling to want to have a story or an explanation for why good things happen to some people and why bad things happen to other people. … I think karma is a really nicely packaged way that maybe has found its way into religion and other belief systems.' The concept of karma originates from Asian religious traditions such as Hinduism and Buddhism, and many variations exist in how it's practiced between different groups, White said. For this reason, the study sampled participants from the United States, Singapore and India to get a broad range of cultural and religious backgrounds. Notably, results skewed slightly differently between Western and non-Western respondents, with Indian and Singaporean participants showing less self-enhancing bias — a finding that is consistent with previous research. 'We found very similar patterns across multiple cultural contexts, including Western samples, where we know people often think about themselves in exaggeratedly positive ways, and samples from Asian countries where people are more likely to be self-critical,' White said. 'But across all countries, participants were much more likely to say that other people face karmic punishments while they receive karmic rewards.' White said her future research will explore how these beliefs around karma affect decision-making. 'There's sometimes differences between your religious beliefs, what people actually think about in everyday life, and then how they act,' White said. 'There could be other situations where they are prompted by the experience itself, and they're going to think about karma in a very different way.' Still, belief-driven biases can have broad, real-world implications, especially when it comes to policymaking and our justice system, Heck said. Often, social prejudices such as racism and classism function on the premise that an 'inferior' group earned its status by behaving in a way that is socially unacceptable, said Yudit Jung, an adjunct associate professor of psychology at Emory University in Atlanta who was not involved in the research. Such views can then inform people's treatment of those groups and their willingness to offer help. Ultimately, Jung, who is also a practicing psychoanalyst, said she believes the studied biases are common to most people. They can be a form of defense, originating from early childhood experiences and the need to feel secure. 'I work with patients a lot on (developing) compassion and a sense of shared humanity, recognizing that we are all a mixture of good and bad,' Jung said. 'It's not about influencing religion. It's about a patient's basic ethics.'
NDTV
02-05-2025
- General
- NDTV
New Study Finds What People Think Of Karma And Its Rewards
A majority of people believe that karma, the idea that good deeds are rewarded and bad actions are punished, works, a new study has found. About 59 per cent of the 2,000 people of religious and non-religious backgrounds part of the study claimed to have received rewards for their good deeds. Speaking about others, a vast majority, 92 per cent, said cheating partners, indebted friends, bullies and coworkers were at the receiving end of the karma for their actions, according to a new study published by the American Psychological Association in the journal Psychology of Religion and Spirituality. The 2,000 individuals, who took part in the study, were from the US, India, and Singapore, CNN reported. According to the study, people believe doing good deeds raises the probability of better outcomes, while they fear the opposite for unkind, indifferent and negative behaviour. Cindel White, the senior author of the study, explained that considering karma allowed people to feel proud and claim personal credit, even if the cause for the favourable result was uncertain or unknown. She added that it also enabled individuals to view the suffering of others as justified retaliation. Ms White noted the results offered insights into how our minds assessed ourselves and others. According to the study, the tendency was a component of attribution bias. People often use this psychological pattern to defend their self-esteem by explaining occurrences in well-documented ways. Patrick Heck, a psychologist with the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, noted that karma provided a convenient framework for people to feel good about themselves, something most people desired. Cultural differences have also been incorporated into the study, enabling comparisons between the thought processes of individuals from Western countries, such as the United States, and those from countries like India and Singapore. It concluded that Indians and Singaporeans were comparatively self-critical, but Americans displayed a larger self-enhancing attitude.
Time of India
01-05-2025
- General
- Time of India
Does karma really work? Do bad people really pay the price? Here's what new study says
Self-praise and harsh judgement Live Events Attribution bias and the need for justice Cultural nuances Implications beyond belief FAQs (You can now subscribe to our (You can now subscribe to our Economic Times WhatsApp channel A sizable number of people across the world believe in karma—the idea that good deeds bring rewards and bad ones attract wrath of the universe. A new study, published by the American Psychological Association, shows how people apply this belief differently when thinking about themselves versus study, published on May 1, in APA's Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, revealed that people are more inclined to attribute their own good fortune to karmic rewards while viewing others' suffering as deserved per a CNN report, the research team led by Cindel White , a PhD candidate from York University, analysed responses of over 2,000 participants from the United States, India, and Singapore. These participants were asked to write about karmic experiences of their own lives and that of results were striking with nearly 59 per cent of the participants describing positive events they experienced as karmic reward. In contrast, nearly 92 per cent of these participants saw that the negative outcome others faced was karmic the same, White said that thinking about karma gives people scope to take personal credit and feel pride, even when it is not clear what makes them deserving of the good outcome. However, she added, it also allows people to see others' suffering as justified researchers, reportedly, said that this tendency is a part of attribution bias. This is a well-documented psychological pattern, wherein people explain events in ways that protect their Heck, a psychologist at US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, noted that people generally want to feel good about themselves and karma gives a convenient framework to do the acceptance that karma-inflicted punishment exists for others fits into the structure of believing in a just world. The belief in a just world enables people to make sense of random events or unfair study has also included cultural differences , allowing them to compare how people from western nations like the United States think as opposed to those from places like India and Singapore. It inferred that Americans showed a stronger self-enhancing bias while Indians and Singaporeans were relatively self-critical. However, the overall pattern can be observed across feel that these biases reflect truly in real life. Yudit Jung, an Emory University psychology professor, told CNN that notions of deservingness might stoke social prejudices like racism and classism. She advised that compassion and the perception of shared humanity may help counter such biases. The team headed by White intends to study in another research how karma beliefs affect decision making.A: The key finding states that individuals have a tendency to perceive good things in their own lives as karmic rewards and bad things occurring to others as deserved punishment.A: Yes, Indian and Singapore participants were less self-enhancing biased than American participants, reflecting cultural differences in self-perception.
Time Magazine
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Magazine
Why We Think We Deserve Good Karma—And Others Don't
For thousands of years, people have waited on karma to catch up with their good behavior—or promised it would roll around for anyone who crossed them. The lure of karmic thinking is that if you do good things, positive outcomes will rain down on you, while the opposite is true for those who don't uphold the same standard of morals. In other words: You reap what you sow. 'It's a fairly common belief—at least the general idea that there's a bigger force outside of human beings, like a cosmic force that ensures that in the long run, good things happen to good people, and bad things happen to bad people,' says Cindel White, an assistant professor of social and personality psychology at York University in Toronto who has long studied karma. Despite the fact that so many people subscribe to this supernatural belief system, researchers still don't know a lot about it, including 'how that belief looks in their daily life, how they feel about it, and how they think about it,' she says. That's why, in a study published May 1 in the journal Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, White and her colleagues investigated how people's psychological motivations drive their beliefs about karma. They found a rather self-serving distinction in exactly how those views play out: Across populations, when people think about their own karma, it tends to be quite positive. But when they consider how karma affects others? Well, let's just say there are a lot of people who had it coming. The enduring draw of karma The concept of karma is rooted in the worldview of many Asian religious traditions, like Hinduism and Buddhism, but it's also become prevalent in other places, including nonreligious communities. In the last couple years, it's saturated pop-culture: Taylor Swift, Chappell Roan, and JoJo Siwa, among other artists, all released karma-themed songs. In Swift's tune, she compares good karma to everything from her boyfriend to a cat purring in her lap because it loves her. 'Karma's a relaxing thought,' she croons. 'Aren't you envious that for you it's not?' The cultural pull toward divine justice has to do with our desire to believe that acting ethically and with compassion will be rewarded—meaning we all have some influence over our destiny. 'People want to feel that their lives are fair,' White says. 'They like it when people treat each other fairly, and when they think they're going to go through the world in ways that are predictable and people get what they deserve.' Believing in karma can make setbacks and other challenges easier to endure, she adds, since at some point down the road, good behavior will surely be rewarded. 'Karma and other supernatural beliefs make you think there are higher powers making sure that in the long run, you're going to get what you deserve,' White says. 'It can make you feel optimistic and reassured that, eventually, things will turn out for the best.' A self-serving perspective In their new research, White's team conducted several experiments with more than 2,000 people, who they asked to write about karmic events in their own life or the lives of others. Most people (86%) chose to write about something that had happened to themselves, and of those people, nearly 59% described a positive experience—the result, they believed, of karma. A smaller selection of White's study participants (14%) chose to write about something that had happened to other people—and 92% focused on a negative experience caused by bad karma. In another experiment, people were told to write about something that happened to either themselves or to someone else, and overall, 69% of those writing about themselves focused on a positive karmic experience, while 18% of those assigned to write about someone else centered on a positive experience. The takeaway was clear: Karma is good when we're thinking about how it affects our own lives, and bad when we consider how it affects others. The results reinforce the idea that we're all psychologically motivated to perceive ourselves as 'virtuous and deserving of good fortune,' as the study authors put it, 'and to perceive other people as recipients of just punishments for their misdeeds.' 'People are generally pretty motivated to view themselves positively and think about all sorts of things in their life in ways that put themselves in a positive light,' White says. 'You can feel good about yourself by thinking you're in control of the good things that are happening to you, and you can feel confident in your future if you think you can do good things now to create good for your future self.' There are likely a few explanations for why we focus on karmic punishment when considering how karma affects other people. In part, we don't feel a strong need to view other people positively. 'There are lots of reasons that you want to have more confidence in yourself by seeing yourself in a positive light, but we don't have the same motivation to focus on positivity in other people's lives,' White says. Explaining other people's negative experiences as karmic punishment, she adds, satisfies our justice motive—or natural inclination to believe that people receive what they deserve. Further research White is continuing to study karma, including whether karmic thinking makes you act more generously toward other people, and more or less likely to help them or punish them. So far, it appears that keeping karma front of mind has 'pretty positive consequences,' she says—though some people do become overly fixated on karmic punishment for others. 'It's all part of the picture of these bigger supernatural belief systems, where it brings a lot to people's lives and can make them feel better about certain things,' she says. 'But it's not a universal good in every situation.'
