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Sara Lumbreras and Lluis Oviedo | Belief networks as complex systems
are open to interaction with the environment and with others, so
that beliefs are adapted in the light of new evidence or through in-
teraction with others (Crocker/Fiske/Taylor 1984; Rodriguez/Bol-
len/Ahn 2016; Sodian/Zaitchik/Carey 1991).
̟ Belief systems are complex.
They can be generated from a relatively simple starting set of ideas,
but they are not easy to understand or predict. There is a breadth
of literature that deals with how to predict belief formation and
evolution depending on personal characteristics. Personal features
such as analytic cognitive style (Pennycook et al. 2012), feelings of
superiority (Toner et al. 2013), or even parenting styles (Ruffman/
Perner/Parkin 1999) have been shown to influence belief formation
and change.
̟ Belief networks, as complex systems, are subject to nonlinear phenom-
ena.
Nonlinearity means that the same stimuli do not lead always to the
same response. For instance, it takes more information to change
beliefs than to confirm them. This bias appears also in many sys-
tems under the general name of hysteresis. Hysteresis occurs when
the response depends on the history of the system. For example, a
magnet may have more than one possible magnetic moment in a
given magnetic field, depending on how the field changed in the
past. Hysteresis has been studied in physics, chemistry, engineer-
ing, biology, and economics, and probably also appears in belief
change. In addition, some complex systems can experience very
different states with respect to change: a relatively stable state
when changes are slow and a “crisis” state when changes can hap-
pen rapidly and spread widely. This has been thoroughly studied,
again, in magnetism, and has been observed in what is known as
the Ising model (Kaneyoshi/Jaščur/Fittipaldi 1993), which de-
scribes a magnetic material in terms of its microscopic domains. In
belief networks, change is generally difficult but, in times of crisis,
the change in one belief can spread to a large number of them. This
is true for personal and for social beliefs, where the crisis dynamic
could be explained as a paradigm shift (Jones 1977).
Limina
Grazer theologische Perspektiven, Band 3:2
- Titel
- Limina
- Untertitel
- Grazer theologische Perspektiven
- Band
- 3:2
- Herausgeber
- Karl Franzens University Graz
- Datum
- 2020
- Sprache
- deutsch
- Lizenz
- CC BY-NC 4.0
- Abmessungen
- 21.4 x 30.1 cm
- Seiten
- 270
- Kategorien
- Zeitschriften LIMINA - Grazer theologische Perspektiven