Analytic thinking can decrease religious belief

"A new University of British Columbia study finds that analytic thinking can decrease religious belief, even in devout believers.

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Researchers used problem-solving tasks and subtle experimental priming – including showing participants Rodin’s sculpture The Thinker or asking participants to complete questionnaires in hard-to-read fonts – to successfully produce “analytic” thinking. The researchers, who assessed participants’ belief levels using a variety of self-reported measures, found that religious belief decreased when participants engaged in analytic tasks, compared to participants who engaged in tasks that did not involve analytic thinking."

The University of British Columbia, Apr. 26, 2012