Behaviorists, social learning theorists, evolutionary psychologists, cognitive psychologists, and neuroscientists have all brought their theories and methods to the study of human religious experience. This chapter explores how these approaches have added texture, depth, and data to the psychology of religion. We see that while most traditional behaviorists thought religious behavior did not require special theorizing, some psychologists of religion have relied heavily on classical conditioning, reinforcement contingencies, shaping, modeling, and other concepts from learning theory to explain religious life. Social cognitive theory has also been influential. In recent decades, an approach called the cognitive science of religion has built on work in evolutionary theory and cognitive psychology. This approach suggests that successful religious beliefs and practices have thrived precisely because they fit well with existing cognitive architecture – even though that architecture originally emerged for evolutionary reasons entirely unrelated to religion. The chapter concludes with an assessment of several approaches to religion grounded in biology and neuroscience.

The application of cognitive theories to criminal behaviour has moved through various stages. Sutherland’s Differential Association Theory (1930s/40s) introduced the notion of cognitions (definitions in the theory) as a factor in explaining crime. Following Skinner’s operant learning, Bandura’s social learning theory (1960s/70s) emphasised the role of cognition acquiring and maintaining behaviour, including criminal behaviour. In the 1980s social information processing articulated the sequence of encoding social cues, interpretation of cues, clarification of response goals, response access or construction, response decision and behavioural response. These cognitive processes may be affected by the individual’s emotional state, particularly anger in crimes of interpersonal violence. The 1980s also gave the view of the criminal as a rational decision-maker prepared to seize an opportunity to offend. The theories have given two contrasting approaches to crime reduction: (i) change offenders’ thinking and values; (ii) remove the opportunity for crime through situational crime prevention.