Author(s): Orhan GÜRSU
Studies in the field of neuroscience enable the human brain to be understood better. In particular, studies conducted through medical imaging devices during the last 30-40 years provide detailed information about the brain's working system. These developments made it more understandable, how and in which regions, negative feelings such as, fear, anxiety, grief, sadness, pessimism, stress, anger, hatred, depression, and so on and positive feelings such as joy, happiness, confidence, calmness, peace, optimism, friendship, and helping affect the brain. These developments also provide convenience for science branches such as psychology and religion. It can be predicted that the opportunities provided by neuroscience studies facilitate psychological well-being and the foundations of the religion to be understood better. Furthermore, whether there is a therapeutic contribution of belief systems that offer a way of life and psychology that serves to understand humanity may become understandable, depending on developments in the field of neuroscience. Today, depending on technological and scientific developments, it becomes more important to understand the effect of religion on psychological well-being through the help of brain imaging devices. In other words, with the development of functional brain imaging techniques, neuroscience made significant progress in finding the projections of human behaviors, emotions, attitudes and beliefs in the brain. The majority of the studies conducted in the West have reported findings showing the way in which this relationship prevails. From this point of view, in this study, we are going to investigate the relationship between neuropsychology and religion. Then, we will focus on how psychological well-being is influenced by religious belief, depending on neuropsychological data. In this context, we are going to present a review of the psychological evaluations obtained from the literature. The limitations of this study include the question, what may be the prescriptions suggested by religions in general and Islam in particular, which may contribute to psychological well-being. The effect of religious beliefs and practices on the psychological well-being process will be presented by presenting examples from experimental studies.
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