Using a comparative analysis of Navajo healing ceremonials, acupuncture and biomedical treatment, this essay examines placebo studies and ritual theory as mutually interpenetrating disciplines. Healing rituals create a receptive person susceptible to the influences of authoritative culturally sanctioned 'powers'. The healer provides the sufferer with imaginative, emotional, sensory, moral and a...

OBJECTIVE Genital neonatal herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) infection was observed in a series of neonates after traditional Jewish ritual circumcision. The objective of this study was to describe neonate genital HSV-1 infection after ritual circumcision and investigate the association between genital HSV-1 after circumcision and the practice of the traditional circumcision. METHODS Eight ...

This paper asks about the production of religious community in modern society: How can the success of a strict Evangelical community in a secularized environment be explained? To find an answer to this question, an approach to emotion based on Randall Collins’ interaction ritual chain theory is applied to data from participant observation in an Evangelical church in Switzerland. The weekly serv...

Rituals are found in all types of performance domains, from high-stakes athletics and military to the daily morning preparations of the working family. Yet despite their ubiquity and widespread importance for humans, we know very little of ritual's causal basis and how (if at all) they facilitate goal-directed performance. Here, in a fully pre-registered pre/post experimental design, we examine...

Activities relating to the discovery of local history, revival of rituals, and modification of traditional knowledge that are undertaken in local communities or associations have placed the reflection on the role and significance of heritage practices in contemporary society under scrutiny. We are becoming increasingly aware that heritage activities play an important role in the development of ...

BACKGROUND In Israel, virtually all children undergo circumcision in the neonatal period. Traditionally, it is commonly performed by a "Mohel" (ritual circumciser) but lately there is an increasing tendency among the educated secular population to prefer a medical procedure performed by a physician and with local anesthetic injection. OBJECTIVES To evaluate the outcome of this procedure and t...

Achieving goals often requires the completion of sequential actions, such as finishing a series of assignments to pass a class. In the course of pursuing such goals, people can decide how closely to follow their personal standards for each action. We propose that actions at the beginning and end of a sequence appear more diagnostic of the pursuer's personal standards than do actions in the midd...