The abstract: "The neuropsychology of religious activity in normal and selected clinical populations is reviewed. Religious activity
includes beliefs, experiences, and practice. Neuropsychological and functional imaging findings, many of which have
derived from studies of experienced meditators, point to a ventral cortical axis for religious behavior, involving primarily
the ventromedial temporal and frontal regions. Neuropharmacological studies generally point to dopaminergic activation
as the leading neurochemical feature associated with religious activity. The ventral dopaminergic pathways involved in religious
behavior most closely align with the action-extrapersonal system in the model of 3-D perceptual–motor interactions
proposed by Previc (1998). These pathways are biased toward distant (especially upper) space and also mediate related
extrapersonally dominated brain functions such as dreaming and hallucinations. Hyperreligiosity is a major feature of
mania, obsessive-compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, temporal-lobe epilepsy and related disorders, in which the ventromedial
dopaminergic systems are highly activated and exaggerated attentional or goal-directed behavior toward extrapersonal
space occurs. The evolution of religion is linked to an expansion of dopaminergic systems in humans, brought about by
changes in diet and other physiological influences."