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Journal of Religion and Health

Erschienen in:

18.03.2017 | Original Paper

Importance of Religion or Spirituality and Mental Health in Canada

verfasst von: Maryam Dilmaghani

Erschienen in: Journal of Religion and Health | Ausgabe 1/2018

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Abstract

Using the latest mental health cycle of the Canadian Community Health Survey (N = 20,868), this paper examines how the importance of religion or spirituality in one’s life associates with mental health. Based on this question, the population is divided into three groups of high religiosity, average religiosity, and secularized. Secularized individuals are shown to have large deficits in all the psychological markers suggested to mediate the relationship between religiosity and mental health, compared to the two other groups. In spite of these deficits, the secularized and the highly religious are found almost equally more likely to rate their mental health as excellent, than the individuals with average religiosity. Interestingly, these two groups are also more likely to rate their mental health as poor. Considering the ability to deal with day-to-day demands and unexpected problems in life as the dependent variable yields comparable results. Various explanations are explored.

The CCHS does not record the religious affiliation of the respondents. However, an examination of other nationally representative data sets, such as the General Social Survey, indicates that excluding immigrants, 95% of the religiously affiliated Canadians belong to a Christian denomination. Therefore, it must be assumed that as far as the religious is concerned, the results obtained in this analysis are informative about the Christian faith.

Other data sources, such as the Canadian General Social Survey, indicate that individuals who report religion is very important to them are largely more likely to be frequent churchgoers, and often engage in religious practices on their own. On the other hand, respondents who report religion is not at all important to them are unlikely to ever attend religious services, and sporadically engage in private religious practices.

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Titel: Importance of Religion or Spirituality and Mental Health in Canada
verfasst von: Maryam Dilmaghani
Publikationsdatum: 18.03.2017
Verlag: Springer US
Erschienen in: Journal of Religion and Health / Ausgabe 1/2018
Print ISSN: 0022-4197
Elektronische ISSN: 1573-6571
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-017-0385-1

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