We outline a theory of bounded affinity between religious experiences and beliefs and paranormalism, which emphasizes that religious and paranormal experiences and beliefs share inherent physiological, psychological, and ontological similarities. Despite these parallels, organized religious groups typically delineate a narrow subset of experiences and explanatory frames as acceptable and True, banishing others as either false or demonic. Accordingly, the theory provides a revised definition of the “paranormal” as beliefs and experiences explicitly rejected by science and organized religions. To demonstrate the utility of the theory, we show that, after controlling for levels of conventional religious practice, there is a strong, positive relationship between claiming Christian-based religious experiences and believing in, pursuing, and experiencing the paranormal, particularly among individuals not strongly tethered to organized religion. Bounded affinity theory makes sense of recent non-linear and complex moderation findings in the empirical literature and reiterates the importance of the paranormal for studies of religion.

中文翻译：

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宗教与超自然现象的有界亲和理论

我们概述了宗教体验和信仰与超自然主义之间的有限亲和力理论，该理论强调宗教和超自然体验和信仰具有内在的生理、心理和本体相似性。尽管有这些相似之处，有组织的宗教团体通常将一小部分经验和解释框架描述为可接受和真实的，将其他人视为虚假或恶魔。因此，该理论提供了“超自然”的修订定义，即科学和有组织的宗教明确拒绝的信仰和经验。为了证明该理论的实用性，我们表明，在控制了传统宗教实践的水平之后，声称基于基督教的宗教体验与相信、追求、体验超自然现象，尤其是在没有强烈束缚于有组织的宗教的个人中。有界亲和力理论使经验文献中最近的非线性和复杂的调节发现有意义，并重申了超自然现象对宗教研究的重要性。