The Truth Behind 10 Common Superstitions
2. Are We Just Bird-Brained?
It's not just humans who get caught up in the world of superstition, most of the animal kingdom is at it as well.
In the 1940s, a psychologist by the name of B. F. Skinner performed a series of experiments to try and reproduce superstitious conditioning in animals. He performed many different tests, but the general idea is that he would feed his test subjects of mice and pigeons at random, but whilst they were in a box with levers and buttons.
The animals began to draw false causal links between pressing certain buttons with getting fed and this, in essence, is the same process behind superstitious behaviour in humans (although judging by the picture above, pigeons don't have a problem with stepping on the cracks).
A mouse performing a certain series of movements in order to get a bit of cheese is the same thing as wearing your lucky pants to pass your maths exam.