Religion and well being 22 Jul 2009 A paper in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry is reviewed by the awesome Epiphenom. The authors do a horizontal study and find that fewer people in religious communities suffer depression, and a longitudinal study that suggests this is not a matter of self-selection: those in religious communities, as measured by frequency of prayer, really are less susceptible to depression than those not. What does it mean? I think, and this is just me doing the armchair philosopher thing, that the reason why religion has an effect on mental well being is because humans are basically social (troop) animals, and being religious means, almost by definition, that one is in a troop. Hence, the feelings of social isolation and lack of support that might trigger depression are reduced. This doesn’t mean that religion is the only way to find community and support. Sporting clubs, the local pub in British culture, Cheers, and of course, freethinking communities all play much the same role. I would love to see some comparative work done on non-religious or quasireligious communities. It’s not that the atheists are stealing from religions, although some of that is the case. It’s that religions and irreligions, if we can call them that, are reaching into the same deep human necessities of communal attachment. It means that while religion is an adaptive response to large scale communities, it need not be the adaptation; but only one of a number. It also means that instead of taking the trite clichés seriously about a good life needing a moral center, etc., we might be inclined to see what religion offers as being a way in which ape sociality plays out when you have large scale populations, as I have said before. Ethics and Moral Philosophy Evolution Religion Social evolution
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I agree that it would be nice to have some comaprison with nonreligious and quasireligious societies. A comparison that one would think would be fairly easy to do would be to compare churches to Ethical Societies, which are already on the ground, fairly well-developed and well-defined, and fairly easy to locate.
The church has a powerful role as a centre of community, one that people turn up to every week at the same time on the same day (the sabbath – also a potent social tool), for a communal purpose. For that reason, I think the idea of atheist or humanist “churches” is maybe not so silly. People need a reason to get together and think about things in a community context.
This armchair philosopher arrived at the same conclusions a long time ago and is pleased to see that you agree with him.
Also in agreement. I think another difference would be the implementation of ritual. Clearly, ritual is not necessarily religious (music, dance, watching/doing sporting activities), but it isn’t something that is purposefully incorporated into things like ethical societies. Indeed, atheist groups that one might consider to be analogous to religious groups actually work the opposite way, by being largely defined by much individual thinking and argument rather than a general submission to a collective mindset. Where do atheists get their fix of sensory deprivation/distraction, and if they don’t get it, does this effect their mental health?
It appears you missed the actual conclusion of the study. Prayer was not the link, it barely had a positive correlation. The frequency of church going was the actual overwhelming factor in the depression/religious link. After reading the study, I think that the conclusion was well defined before the research, similar to the conclusion of breast cancer linking to abortion by anti-abortion studies. This study may not have been as blatant, but it does appear to selectively poll other research in order to find its conclusion.
What’s the correlation between being stupid and depression? I’m betting it’s slightly negative – about the same as being religious. Considering the state of the world, not being somewhat depressed may be maladaptive.
DSKS, this is something I’ve thought about with respect to U2 concerts. When Bono points the microphone or otherwise gestures towards the audience for response, we know what to say or sing: we belong to the church of U2. We know the ritual, the words, the body language. I am an atheist, but I understand I am part of a spiritual experience, albeit a secular one and I can feel those endorphins secreting.
Where do atheists get their fix of sensory deprivation/distraction, and if they don’t get it, does this effect their mental health? We go to our secret shrines (usually cleverly disguised as pubs), where we partake of the sacred mead, worship at statues of Darwin and ponder how we can cleverly institute eugenics programs and pin it on John Harvey Kellogg. BWAHAHAHAHAHA!
To appreciate the impact of the social aspect of religion (compared to other social groupings), it’s important to remember that there’s a large intergenerational/ family component to the former which may be less evident, and certainly less formalized in the latter (reinforced by regular ritual, marking of life events – birth, marriage, death, among other aspects of religion as a community). Not sure what this says to those who wish to emulate this community in a non-religious form – at its best its a tough act to follow (and, of course, at its worst its a no-brainer).
Actually, all communities and societies have non-religious observations that occur regularly. Sporting events, musical events, theatre, neighborhood pot-lucks and even the work/school environments can satisfy many of the rituals and sense of communal belonging that occurs in religious social circles. Religion, however, is really the only one that is designed to exclude, or to make one feel exclusionary and special. The religious experience, in my view, is more narcissistic at its very base level. Narcissists tend to have higher self-esteems, especially as an outward projection to others. Non-religious people are very highly aware of that attitude, especially those that were raised at an early age and turned rebellious. Societies will continue to evolve and develop strategies for the survival of a majority, with or without religion and belief systems.
Sporting events, musical events, theatre, neighborhood pot-lucks and even the work/school environments can satisfy many of the rituals and sense of communal belonging that occurs in religious social circles. Religion, however, is really the only one that is designed to exclude, or to make one feel exclusionary and special… It’s not easy to argue the relative exclusivity/inclusivity of various “communal” experiences, other than from personal experience. My point was that there is an intergenerational (“passed down from father to son” if you want a not-very-PC metaphor) aspect to religion which is not found (in my experience) to the same extent in other communal activities.
You’ve never met a Chicago sports fan family, have you? Their belief systems can be almost as strong as the evangelical system.
I guess for some strong sports fans, their fervent belief system does include prayer, belief in the omnipotent, etc. But what I was trying to point out is that the family is usually heavily included in the event, and the traditions of observance does fall father to son, yet it isn’t really a religion, at least not in the classical sense.
“You’ve never met a Chicago sports fan family, have you?” Yeah, those Cubs fans are worse than the Mormons. Go Pujols (pbuh)!
“Hence, the feelings of social isolation and lack of support that might trigger depression are reduced.” You’re describing/attempting to reconstruct Durkheim’s concept of anomie, as put forth in Suicide. Well, he took a slightly earlier swing with it, but it’s the later usage that’s lasted. So, if nothing else, you’re in good company. Philosophically, if not scientifically.
Maybe. The Durkheimian analysis is far too cultural for my satisfaction. I dislike people making general claims based on cultural contingencies. That’s not to say he couldn’t have got it right by an intuitive grasp of the matter, but I think until we have a proper account of the neurobiology I will remain rather unhappy with his view as I understand it. Likewise his account of religion strikes me as way too universalistic for the evidence he adduces.
Well, yeah, his methodology alone was crap on a number of levels, to say nothing of the limited life sciences he had access to in his time. I’ve never thought of anomie (or much of Suicide) as anything approaching modern social science, more as a ‘respectable early attempt’. (Mechanical and organic solidarity, on the other hand, have a lot to recommend them as perspective on organizing principles of and survival tactics within a wide variety of systems. Anything that can potentially be applied to ‘why we don’t have to all grow our own food’ and ‘why multicellular life might have moved from homogenous mass to heterogeneous tissues’ is pretty keen.) It just seemed to me that you were striking a not dissimilar chord with the thoughts on group/troop integration potentially affecting mental health. Albeit one that’s much better informed as to the potential complications of the ideas that are presented by 21st century neuroscience.
I don’t find Durkheim very usefull its far too general. Saying that I will make a general point. One of the functions of ritual is often to create an ingroup and outgroup; exclusion and exclusivity is a key factor in many rituals, its not a factor limited to religion. Increased health for whom and whats the overall health cost for non-conformity within a dominant cultural in-group? “What happened to me is something that never goes away….It was a dreadful ordeal, and all this doesn’t help. I don’t know what’s happening over there now, and I don’t want to. I have a happy life now. ” http://news.scotsman.com/weirdoddandquirkystories/Sicilian-fires-recall-nannys-witch.2502912.jp http://www.asianimage.co.uk /news/4332798.Increase_in_Muslims_calling_helpline/