Religion as a Support System for Mental Health

Abstract

28 p.Research demonstrates that religion and its community can used to be an aid. Religion can provide comfort in times of distress (Sen et al., 2022), and can provide security to soften grief and death anxiety (Brown et al., 2004; Fortuin et al., 2018). It can also provide community to discourage loneliness, and to build supportive atmospheres that have been thought to promote not just better mental health, but better physical health too (Chan et al., 2018). The present study therefore recognizes the potential positive relationship between mental health and religion and uses a combined version of two datasets from surveys conducted by Add Health (About – Add Health, n.d.), to assess a potential relationship between religiosity and mental health. Contrary to my hypothesis, the results revealed no significant relationship between mental health and religiosity, and although there was a positive correlation as expected, it was weak. Future research should narrow down the field of religion, perhaps investigating mental health within separate religions first, or on an even narrower scale, investigating the mental health within specific religious communities/places of worship. It is also recognized that religious groups are not always supportive environments, particularly to marginalized groups, and this too must be considered for future research