020091 VO Religion as Experience: Introduction to the Psychology of Religion (2008W)

Psychology of religion is an interdisciplinary field par excellence that interlinks psychological theories and theories of religion based on different anthropologies. All notable psychological and psychotherapeutic schools were more or less involved in religion, searching for the intrapsychic emergence and function of religion for psychic processes. The psychology of religion is an empirical science. It also works with empirical methods and searches for the psychosocial conditions of religious experiences, ideas and modes of behaviour. The lectures present empirical methods and different concepts especially in relation to anthropology and theory of religion. Thus the focus is on epistemological questions concerning conditions, premises and methods. Compared to theology that works on the basis of content and normatively, psychology of religion with its perspective from outside is concerned with examining kinds of subjective religiosity and their functions