I found this quote in a psychology paper entitled If We Are So Rich, Why Aren't We Happy? by M. Csikszentmihalyi:
“Thus, the results of culturally and methodologically circumscribed studies need to be taken with more than the usual grain of salt.”
focusing more on the part:
studies need to be taken with more than the usual grain of salt
What does this idiom or phrase means?
Best Answer
The writer is altering the well-known idiom take something with a grain of salt to get a new meaning. (I believe this is an example of metalepsis). Here’s a relevant entry for take something with a grain of salt:
In this case, by analogy, if a grain of salt represents a certain level of skepticism, then more than the usual grain of salt suggests that we should be more skeptical than usual.