Thursday, August 4, 2022

Our main finding is that people who had a spiritual understanding of life had worse mental health

From Religion, spirituality and mental health: results from a national study of English households by  Michael King, Louise Marston, Sally McManus, Terry Brugha, Howard Meltzer, and Paul Bebbington.

I have long regarded those claiming to be "spiritual" but not religious as merely pusillanimous.  Apparently there is more to the "spiritual" position than I would have anticipated.  

Our main finding is that people who had a spiritual understanding of life had worse mental health than those with an understanding that was neither religious nor spiritual. Those who were religious were broadly similar, in terms of prevalence of mental disorder and use of mental health treatments, to those who were neither religious nor spiritual after adjustment for potential confounders, except they were significantly less likely to use, or be dependent on, drugs or alcohol. This supports evidence from a national UK sample of people from a range of Black and minority ethnic groups Reference King, Weich, Nazroo and Blizard on the vulnerability of people who describe themselves as spiritual. It adds to the evidence that people with a spiritual understanding in the absence of a religious framework appear to have the worst mental health.

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