Religious and spiritual experiences from a neuroscientific and complex systems perspective.
Peter Jedlicka, Martha Nari Havenith
Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews October 1, 2025 DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106319 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Review Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Near-death experience |
| Keywords | Complex systems Degeneracy Ecstatic epilepsy Evolutionary medicine Predictive coding Reductionism Salience network sn |
| Citations | 3 |
| Key findings | Neurospirituality research should avoid excessive reductionism and dualism, instead using limited reductionism balanced by dynamical systems, complex systems, and network theory. |
Abstract
The emergence of spiritual and religious practices can be seen as a major cognitive transition in the evolution of biological organisms. Spiritual and religious experiences are closely linked to evolved complex brain structures, as well as their dynamics and plasticity. In this review, we will focus on the neural mechanisms that make such experiences possible. We will also address the methodological, neurophilosophical and neurotheological questions concerning the extent to which religious and spiritual experiences can be neurobiologically explained. We will summarise the rapidly expanding knowledge about the neuroscience of meditation and prayer, near-death experiences, ecstatic epilepsy, psychedelic experiences, and changes in spirituality associated with brain lesions. Additionally, we will discuss the validity of suggestions, based on predictive processing theory, that ecstatic states may represent a pathology of the mind and brain in the form of impaired prediction. Finally, we will describe the beneficial and therapeutic effects of spiritual and religious routines and practices and put them in the context of evolutionary medicine. Overall, we will argue that 'neurospirituality' research can be fruitful if it avoids both excessive reductionism as well as dualism. Instead, it should be based on limited reductionism, balanced by more integrative, non-localisationist approaches, including dynamical systems, complex systems and network theory.
Comparable studies
Other narrative reviews on near-death experience, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Distressing Near-Death Experiences | 1992 | Review | |
| Attitude Change Following Near-Death Experiences Individuals who have had near-death experiences | 1980 | Review | n = 21 |
| Near-death experiences. | 2004 | Review | |
| The Handbook of Near-Death Experiences | 2009 | Review | |
| Near-death experiences in cardiac arrest survivors | 2005 | Review |
Citations in the library
Cited by 3
- The infinity object: neurophenomenology and psychoanalytic corollaries of near-death experiences Frontiers in Psychiatry November 6, 2026
- Subject combination and the initiatory experience in Śrīvidyā Religious Studies June 29, 2026
- Religion and Aesthetics: A Structured Integrative Review Toward A Process Model of Sacred and Aesthetic Experience European Journal of Education and Counselling April 30, 2026
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- Psilocybin can occasion mystical-type experiences having substantial and sustained personal meaning and spiritual significance Psychopharmacology July 7, 2006
- Meditation experience is associated with differences in default mode network activity and connectivity Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences November 23, 2011
- A Theoretically Based Index of Consciousness Independent of Sensory Processing and Behavior Science Translational Medicine August 14, 2013
and 119 more in the library