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Dr Jesse Bering

On leave 2011-12

Dr. Jesse M. Bering is Director of the Institute of Cognition and Culture (ICC) and Reader in the School of History and Anthropology. He is interested in those aspects of human cognition for which there is evidence suggestive of human uniqueness from other animals. Bering's MS-level training focussed on the psychological differences between human beings and chimpanzees, and this early exposure to comparative psychology, combined with his PhD in developmental psychology, led to his work studying how the evolved human mind plays a part in religious thinking. More recently, Bering and his students have begun investigating how our ancestors' concerns about their reputations may have fundamentally altered the course of human social evolution.

 

Select Publications

The god instinct: the psychology of souls, destiny and the meaning of life (London, 2010)