Under the Microscope: Psychologists define magical thinking as non-scientific causal reasoning - for example superstition. Magic concerns itself with causal relations, but, unlike science, it does not distinguish correlation from causation.
Most people, even scientists, indulge in some magical thinking in their everyday lives. For example, I have a "lucky" pen. I once wrote a paper for a prestigious scientific journal using this pen and I now prefer to use it when writing very "important stuff". A professor of mathematics recently told me that he never watches Cork playing hurling because they never win when he watches. The capacity and appetite for such beliefs seems to be rooted in the circuitry of the brain. Excessive development of this capacity can lead to compulsive or delusional behaviour.
Sympathetic magic is an example of magical thinking, the notion that manipulating effigies or symbols can affect the thing represented by the symbol, eg the use of voodoo dolls. Another type of magical thinking is the idea that your thoughts can influence events, eg wishing harm on someone can make him/her ill. Another type of magical thinking is believing that the use of or non-use of words can affect the world, eg if you avoid talking about the flu, you won't get it. And of course, superstitions of different sorts, like my lucky pen, etc.
By and large, magical thinking has little to do with intelligent practice of religion which is a much more complex phenomenon involving questions of morality, history and community. However, I suppose that some forms of non-reflective prayer and devotion to "relics" would qualify as magical thinking.
According to James George Frazer (1854-1941), the Scottish social anthropologist who studied mythology and comparative religion, magical thinking works according to two laws: the law of similarity (a cause resembles its effect), and the law of contagion (a connection remains between things that were once in physical connection even after the connection has been broken). For example, one study showed that participants were reluctant to wear clothing that had previously been worn by Nazis, even though the clothing had been scrupulously cleaned. Also, ancient cosmology saw the universe as a series of spheres, concentric on the Earth, that touched each other. This allowed the stars in the outer sphere to physically transmit a signal down through the spheres to the earth, thereby providing a mechanism whereby the stars could affect humans.
Some cognitive scientists suggest magical thinking is intrinsic to humanity, because of the similarity they note in such thinking in all human societies in all periods of history. The brain is very good at matching patterns but not so good at distinguishing between real and perceived patterns. "Relationships" that don't exist can often be seen therefore between actions. These relationships then tend to persist because people naturally tend to seek confirmation of their hypotheses and not refutation as in the method of science.
By about 18 months of age children indulge in magical thinking and create imaginary play worlds. They mostly can discriminate between fantasy and reality by the age of three but usually still believe in the Tooth Fairy - with parents' encouragement. By the age of eight most children can distinguish magic from reality as well as adults can.
In a clever series of experiments published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 91, No 2, pp 218-231 (2006), Princeton psychologist Emily Pronin and others showed how easy it is to induce magical thinking in educated young adults. In one experiment the participants were asked to visualise success for a blindfolded basketball player who was "shooting hoops". The experiment was rigged because the player could see through the blindfold, had practised a lot and could reliably score most of his attempts. On questionnaires filled out later the participants indicated that their positive visualisations had contributed to the shooter's success.
In another study the participants put a "voodoo curse" on a study "partner" who pretended to develop a headache. The participants later indicated that they believed the "curse" had worked.
Magical thinking is frequently magnified in mental illnesses such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) or clinical depression. Often in OCD the person uses magical thinking as a ritual to mollify the dread of undertaking perceived dangerous activities. These rituals interfere with ordinary living when the "dangerous" activities are everyday routine activities, eg using the public toilet. Self-confidence is an early casualty in depression and magical thinking can be invoked to bolster confidence, often using good luck charms. The feeling that your thoughts can control things combats the feelings of helplessness that often accompanies depression.
Our brains have evolved to make snap decisions about causation bypassing logic. Magnetic resonance image scans have been made of people's brains as they watched sleight of hand magic tricks, eg making a palmed coin disappear. Spikes of activity appear in the left hemisphere of the brain, the area that usually becomes activated when people form hypothesis in uncertain situations. These activations occur very quickly and can link two events based on no more than coincidence - "I was just thinking about you, when the door bell rang and there you were".
Magical thinking can lead to very inconvenient situations, like the American basketball coach who wears the same outfit so long as his team is winning - socks, the lot. The team is playing very well, but the coach's girlfriend has issued an ultimatum - either his smelly tracksuit outfit goes, or she goes. William Reville is associate professor of biochemistry and public awareness of science officer at UCC - http://understandingscience.ucc.ie