Psychologist Will Gervais will reprise the presentation on “Anti-Atheist Prejudice”  that he gave to the American Humanist Association Annual Conference in May.

Most people believe in a god of some sort. Nonetheless, there are hundreds of millions of nonbelievers in the world, and they face considerable discrimination and prejudice. From a social psychological perspective, this is a puzzling form of prejudice: Atheists do not form a coherent group, they are individually inconspicuous, and they are not, in general, oppositional or threatening. Recent research in social, evolutionary, and cultural psychology, however, offers suggestions for solving the puzzle of anti-atheist prejudice, in terms of both uncovering its psychological causes and also suggesting interventions for reducing it. Will Gervais will summarize research on how greater collective and individual awareness of atheists- through campaigns such as the Openly Secular movement - might impact attitudes toward atheists, He will close with some concrete recommendations for how to potentially overcome societal stigma  against religious belief.

Will Gervais is an evolutionary and cultural psychologist at the University of Kentucky. Broadly, he is interested in why people believe what they believe about the world. His research focuses on the cognitive, evolutionary, and cultural forces that facilitate supernatural beliefs - and how these beliefs, in turn, affect cognition, evolution, and culture.

Humanist Forum events welcome people of all beliefs.