The human tendency to respect people who display behavior that appears supernatural, such as by cult leaders, over others is hardwired rather than socially conditioned, a study of babies suggests for the first time.
Credit: Xianwei Meng
From shamans and mystics to cult leaders and divine kings, why have people throughout history accorded high status to people believed to have supernatural powers?
According to a study led by researchers from the University of Oxford, this tendency to attribute social dominance to such individuals is rooted in early development.
As part of the study, 48 infants aged 12 to 16 months watched a series of animated videos in which two characters competed for a reward. In each scenario, one character displayed physically counterintuitive methods of making progress across the screen - flying or teleporting in the direction of the reward; the other moved more intuitively in continuous paths sticking to the ground, thus lacking any special powers.