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Circumstances predict religiousness. Difficult circumstances lead more strongly to people being religious. And in religious societies and in difficult circumstances, religious people are happier than nonreligious people. But in nonreligious societies or more benign societies where many people’s needs are met, religious people aren’t happier — everyone’s happier.

psychologist Ed Diener, on findings from a recent Gallup World Poll

(source)

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A joyful life is an individual creation that cannot be copied from a recipe.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience

Religion and Happiness related? Not necessarily.

 

I’m sure people have heard studies things that religion is correlated with a long happy life.    I think its been easy to dismiss any such relationship by arguing about all the negatives of religion, but I don’t think I’ve seen a study that really gets at the root of this correlation.   Thankfully a new study dug a little deeper.

“Religious people are happier than secular people, but it’s less about faith than communities of faith,”

…a survey of 3,100 American adults taken in 2006 and 2007. The study was published in the journal American Sociological Review.

The depth of one’s faith or the type of practice doesn’t matter, Putnam said. It’s all about having friends where you worship.

“Praying alone doesn’t have any effect on your life satisfaction” 

I rather like that last line.  Its not faith or religion or god that leads to happiness, but having friends and spending time with them.  Good thing to remember.

Can science answer how to be happy? Sure seems like it...

So one of the ideas that I am  passionate about (much more than simply deriding religions) is “How best to live our lives?”  I obviously do not agree with a pastor / religious institution making up arbitrary things for me to do supposedly dictated from a mythical being, but it does not exactly answer what SHOULD be done.  

I’m increasing in favor or just using common sense and looking to scientific studies to help gather data on those supposedly unanswerable questions.  I’ll skip the “ethics stems from rationality and data” stuff for now and just point out this survey.   What makes people happy?   Are happy people born happy or can you make decisions that influence this.   This study certainly points in the direction that, yes, we can make decisions that effect our happiness.  So if science can explain life, the universe, and even how to live our lives… what was the point of religion again?

Oh and I’d like to point out the study found “Attending church is regularly associated with increased long-term life satisfaction, although the study did not directly measure the effect of religious beliefs on happiness.”   I am actually not surprised by this at all.  I don’t think this contradicts my previous statements though.  Church gives a supportive social network and I think this certainly can be a great thing.   Its all the other BS in church I think is harmful.

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Atheists are happy and fulfilled, as much as anyone else. Many of us seem cranky in arguments on the Internet — but that’s because we’re in arguments on the Internet. In the rest of our lives, we have as much satisfaction, contentment, and joy as anybody. Pass it on: if we say it enough times to enough people, it may get across.
Greta Christina (via Stephen Moore)

Evidence That Little Touches Do Mean So Much

Holy crap.  This is a little off-topic, but I feel compelled to share this article because it’s currently listed as one of the most popular on NYT’s website and it mentions the research of Matt Hertenstein, a psychology professor from my alma mater.  DePauw’s a tiny institution that isn’t exactly known for doing a lot of research, let alone New-York-Times-worthy research.

I suppose it could be tied in to religion (e.g., the churches that stop and make you greet everyone around you in the middle of the Sunday program, shaking your neighbors’ hands and so on).  And this research could be helpful for, well, just about anyone who ever interacts with other people.  I’ll leave the conclusion-drawing to you, though.

-Shane

The Non-Religious Meaning of Meaning

Fact:  being religious is associated with improved psychological well-being (that is, being happier and enjoying better mental health).

That’s bad news for us non-religious folks, right?  Not necessarily.

Research has revealed that a significant portion of the improved well-being religious people experience is due to feeling that their lives are meaningful.  Without religion, though, there are still many things we can do to cultivate meaning in our own lives.  While the lack of belief in any higher power(s) keeps us from believing that there’s an overall meaning of life, we can still have a sense of meaning within our lives.  In doing so, we’ll be able to enjoy some of the improved well-being that religious people get from their religion.

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