~The life benefits of regular church attendance~
Gleanings from real research
by Neil MacQueen
printed from
www.sundaysoftware.com/stats.htm
~The life benefits of regular church attendance~
Gleanings from real research by Neil
MacQueen
What if I told you there was a well-researched and statistically
proven program that on average can:
- increase the average life expectancy of your children by
8 years
 - significantly reduce your child's use and risk from Alcohol, Tobacco
and Drugs
- dramatically lower their risk of suicide
- help them rebound from depression 70% faster
- dramatically reduce their risk for committing a crime
- improve their attitude at school and increase their school
participation
- reduce their risk for rebelliousness
- reduce the likelihood that they would binge drink in college
- improve their odds for a "very happy" life
- provide them with a life-long moral compass
-
provide children with a caring extended family
- get them to wear their seatbelts more often
-
 and will also statistically improve the odds that
they will lead an active church life in their adults years
Is there such a program?
YES, there is.
...And it is supported by research from Duke University, Indiana
University, The University of Michigan, The Center for Disease
Control, Barna Research Group, Gallup, Pew, and the National Institute for
Healthcare Research, and several national surveys. (see the footnotes below).
 How much would a program like
this be worth to you?
What if I told you it was
free, and only took about 2 hours a week?
Would you be interested?
Take a look at the above list again.
It's not a dream.
The program is called "active
church participation."
In study, after study, after study, children who actively
engage in a faith community on a regular basis are rewarded with
SIGNIFICANTLY reduced likelihood of life problems and risky behaviors, and
stand to significantly
improved their odds of a happier, healthier, and longer life. These studies
show the same results for adults as well.
In addition, numerous surveys, including the
latest 2009 Survey by the Barna
Research Group, continue to show a strong statistical connection between
being active in the church as a child and staying active as an adult.
Furthermore, Barna's recent research indicates that even "being involved at least
a few times a month is
correlated with nearly the same sticking power as weekly involvement –
especially among teenagers." (Read
Barna's 2009 survey on the long term effects of active participation).
 But here's the thing... To increase the odds of
your children receiving these results, you can't
wait. According to a Barna Research Group study,
if a child is not regularly active by the age of 12, the odds of them
getting active DROPS DRAMATICALLY in their teen years and beyond. Indeed, Barna's research indicates that adults who
attended church regularly as children -are nearly three times
as likely to be attending a church today as their peers who avoided
church during childhood (61% to 22%, respectively). In other
words, parents who truly want the best for their children should
get their children involved at church now and regularly. The old
proverb was right on: "Raise up a child in the way they should go," and the
odds are they won't depart from it.
But it's not just about
supervision and keeping kids busy. Our culture has been preaching
"parents (as) the anti-drug," promoting D.A.R.E. programs,
school uniforms, afterschool programs, and athletics as solutions
to our various ills. And arguably, many parents are MORE in touch with their
children today, -than were parents of previous generations.
And yet, a whole host of problems plaguing young
people have only gotten worse over the last 30 years. Perhaps
not so coincidentally, Sunday School and church attendance has fallen over
this same period. What we've learned is that many supervised activities, such
as baseball teams and dance classes, while helpful, are also poor
substitutes for parents and family and the development of the spiritual self.
Though their influence is important, teams,
clubs, teachers and coaches often lack many of the long-term nurturing qualities that
families provide to children, and they often reflect secular values, rather
than the faith values which lead to
spiritual development and church participation.
 Active parenting is vitally important, but
it also takes a caring village to raise a child. Extended families
stimulate the intellectual, social
and spiritual development of children through long-term caring relationships
and the teaching of self-less values at the core of faith.
- Extended faith families teach children and youth
how to develop their internal
life, which is a proven stress-reliever and problem solving skill.
- The Extended faith family offers supervised
egalitarian peer
groups, and interaction with positive role models (who aren't yelling at
them to kick the ball, or benching them for not being good enough).
- The church offers a family atmosphere to
children from broken homes or who's relatives are far-flung or distant.
- Church life allows children to see
their parents demonstrating their values and engaging the world outside of
the home.
- Church life challenges children and
youth to manage their priorities and challenges
them to lead less self-centered lives.
- The Extended faith family offers peer
support and guidance to parents.
- Lessons, sermons, Bible passages and
programs such as Confirmation -open up young people to a world of ideas and
history.
- The practicing of traditions and rituals helps develop a sense of
one's place in "the story."
All of these things (and more we could
mention) highlight
the impact of the "village" in raising a child, ...not to mention the life
benefits from knowing a forgiving and loving God!
[Aside: The author of this article was a
sports coach for many years, as well as, a youth minister and father of
three children. A healthy athletic life is important to the overall
development of a child. This includes learning "teamwork" and how to be
coached. But the values of many teams and coaches are more about competition
and winning than inner development. They may prepare you to be a good
citizen or employee, but team sports, while commendable experiences, do not
emphasize self-development in the way that other outdoor activities and
biblical teachings do. And unfortunately, many of the coaches and athletes
that I've come in contact with over the years were not role models I would
have otherwise wanted my children to be around. Compare the average coach to
the average youth group leader and the kind of activities and values they
will surround your child with. Makes you wonder why some parents choose
sports over church! Aside Over!]
Most parents want what's best for their kids.
They just don't always know what that is.
If
we provide them with the evidence, and a quality experience for their
children, most will respond just as Jesus predicted they would when he said,
"What parent, knowing
their children need bread, would give them a
stone?"
What is also true is
that we need to teach parents the difference between bread and stones.
Simply put, in the search for "what works,"
researchers keep turning up "active participation"
in a "faith community" as the one consistent potent
factor in raising up children to be successful, happy, healthy and engaged
adults both in the church and in the world. It's
time for the Christian Church to once again speak loudly about this,
especially to the parents. Karate classes, travel soccer and getting good
grades, while wonderful in their own right, are poor substitutes for their
children's need for extended family and a healthy inner life (which may even
tap them into the power of the living Christ).
That said.... the church
has often given STONES to parents and children:
boring groups, poor leadership, poorly supported
efforts, and a monolithic one-size-fits -all approach to ministering to
children. For more about bread and stones (what works and what
doesn't) see my article about a "New Vision" for children's ministry located
at www.sundaysoftware.com/stats3.htm
What will parents and churches do now
that the benefits are obvious? In PART II of this series at
www.sundaysoftware.com/stats2.htm,
we'll look at the "excuses" both often use to explain why raising kids
in the church isn't as important or as possible as it once was.
Part II -- Are Our Kids Too Busy
on Sunday Morning?
What the actual research says about where our kids are spending their time.
.
 Who
is Neil MacQueen
I'm a
parent, Presbyterian minister, Christian education
consultant, and Christian software designer. I've been teaching in Sunday
School, Confirmation classes, and leading youth groups for over 25
years. I helped create a new model for Sunday School called the
Workshop Rotation Model (www.rotation.org),
have authored numerous articles for Christian publications. I write and
distribute interactive Bible software for children and youth in an
attempt to attract, engage and teach them God's Word. (www.sundaysoftware.com)
Over the years I've heard all the excuses
about "why kids and parents these days don't...." --and made a few
excuses myself. That prompted me to explore if there was any research
that could help churches do a better job at reaching this generation,
and help parents understand the importance of raising their kids in the
church. Frankly, I was surprised with what I found. I hope
you are too, and that it promotes healthy discussion.
This article may be reprinted provided that the author and
website source (www.sundaysoftware.com/stats.htm)
are included with the article.
See below for the sources of the
statistics mentioned in this article (www.sundaysoftware.com/stats.htm) |
 Continue Reading This Series:
Part II -- Are Our Kids Too Busy
on Sunday Morning?
What the actual research says about where our kids are spending their time
www.sundaysoftware.com/stats2.htm
Part III -- Characteristics of a New
Ministry to Children
A Prescription for improving our ministry to
children based on research and experience.
www.sundaysoftware.com/stats3.htm
You may also be interested in
these related articles:
"Priming" ...the brain science behind Sunday School
The problem with Teenage Sunday School classes, Confessions
of an Old Youth Minister,
The
Tribe13 Experiment, a different kind of youth group
and my ideas on
Promoting Sunday School and
Recruiting
Teachers
Sources and Additional Research for this article
(and some of it quite amazing)
There is a surprising amount of research out
there from a wide variety of sources that has collected data and analyzed it
on the subject of religion and youth. Many of the studies have been funded
by the National Institute of Health, and several prestigious universities.
I've excerpted and linked a few of them below. If the link is dead, the data
may have been moved at the site or may be at a new website. Google it.
Information gleaned from the Barna Research
Group, http://www.barna.org/
Of those who said they led an active faith life, 83
percent said their faith is growing deeper, as opposed to 38%
who defined their faith life as less active. 73% of "active
faith lives" said they were "very happy" with
their lives. Only 57% of agnostics and atheists said they were
"very happy."
Etc...
" Two out of three (67%) unchurched adults call themselves
Christian. (2000)
" One-third (35%) claim they have made a personal commitment
to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life today.
(2000)
" About 4 out of 10 unchurched assert that their religious
faith is very important in their life. (2000)
Taking Children to Church (2001)
" Adults who attended church regularly as a child are nearly
three times as likely to be attending a church today as are their
peers who avoided the church during childhood (61% to 22%, respectively).
" Roughly seven out of ten Americans adults (71%) had a
period of time during their childhood when they regularly attended
a Christian church.
" Just less than two out of three adults (63%) who were
churched as children take their own children to a church, which
is double the proportion among adults who were not churched and
who now take their kids to church (33%).
" Adults who attended church as a child are twice as likely
as others to read the Bible during a typical week; twice as likely
to attend a church worship service in a typical week; and nearly
50% more likely to pray to God during a typical week.
Probability of accepting Christ, segmented by age
" Children between the ages of 5 and 13 have a 32% probability
of accepting Jesus Christ as their savior.
" The probability of accepting Christ drops to 4% for those
who are between the ages of 14 and 18.
" Those older than 18 have a 6% probability of accepting
Jesus Christ as their savior.
 Young people who said that religion is important and who worshiped
regularly had a significantly lower rate of cohabitation
when compared to peers who did not consider religion important
and attended services seldom or never. The cohabitation rate
of those who never attended services was about seven times higher
than those who attended several times a week. Young people who
were more religious had higher rates of marriage than their less
religious peers who often substitued cohabitation for marriage.
Sample or Data Description: Families in the Detroit area
Arland Thornton, William G. Axinn, and Daniel H. Hill, "Reciprocal
Effects of Religiosity, Cohabitation, and Marriage," American
Journal of Sociology. Vol. 98, Number 3. , 1992. Page(s) 628-651.
Regular church attendance during adolescence frequently predicts
a less promiscuous adult life. "Never married women
who did not attend religious services as adolescents are more
than twice as likely to report having two or more recent sex
partners compared to those who did attend services regularly."
Sample or Data Description: 3,378 single women
Source: Stuart N. Seidman, William D. Mosher, and Sevgi O.
Aral, "Predictors of High-Risk Behavior in Unmarried American
Women: Adolescent Environment as Risk Factor." Journal of
Adolescent Health.Vol. 15, Number . , 1994. Page(s) 126-132.
Religious Teens Have More Positive Outlook
Study Finds Link Between Church Attendance, Happiness....Enjoyment --
High school seniors who consider themselves religious have significantly
higher self-esteem and hold more positive attitudes about life
than do their less religious peers, according to a new study.
The research, part of the University of North Carolina-based
National Study of Youth and Religion, revealed a statistical
association between religion and higher self-esteem among 12th-graders
who went to religious services at least once a week or who professed
deeply held spiritual views, said study director Christian Smith.
"We found that of the 13 variables we examined about
attitudes, only one was not significantly related to some dimension
of religion in a positive way," said Smith, a professor
of sociology. "This was contrary to the belief held by some
people that religion is associated with psychological neurosis
or dysfunction. These findings seem to suggest the opposite --
that religion is associated with a constructive outlook."
Researchers found that the 31 percent of all 12th-graders
who attended services weekly and the additional 30 percent who
said religion was very important to them were significantly more
likely than nonreligious students to enjoy life, think their
lives were useful, feel hopeful about their futures, be satisfied
with their lives and enjoy being in school.
The book Soul Searching summarizes the
National Study on Youth and Religion. It reports the findings of The
National Study of Youth and Religion, the largest and most detailed such
study ever undertaken. Based on a nationwide telephone survey of teens
and their parents, as well as in-depth face-to-face interviews with more
than 250 of the survey respondents, Soul Searching shows that religion is
indeed a significant factor in the lives of many American teenagers. Chock
full of carefully interpreted interview data and solid survey statistics,
Soul Searching reveals many surprising findings. For example, the authors
find that teenagers are far more influenced by the religious beliefs and
practices of their parents and other adults than is commonly thought. They
challenge the conventional wisdom that many teens today are "spiritual
seekers." And they show that greater teenage religious involvement is
significantly associated with more positive adolescent life outcomes.
The study showed that religious youth were
less likely to smoke, drink and use drugs and more likely to start later and
use less if they started at all, he said. They went to bars less often,
received fewer traffic tickets, wore seat belts more, took fewer risks and
fought less frequently. Shoplifting, other thefts, trespassing and arson
also were more rare.
"Religious 12th-graders argued with parents less, skipped school less,
exercised more, participated more in student government and faced fewer
detentions, suspensions and expulsions," Smith said.
The National Study of Youth and Religion, funded by Lilly Endowment Inc., is
under the direction of Dr. Christian Smith, Professor of Sociology at the
University of Notre Dame, and Dr. Lisa Pearce, Assistant Professor of
Sociology at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
www.youthandreligion.org
Benefits of Church Attendance in Poor Communities
Students from poor neighborhoods who attend church are also
less likely to engage in violent behavior, says Byron Johnson,
director of the Center for Research on Religion and Urban Civil
Society, which sponsored the Regnerus/Elder study.
In a recent study, researchers Mark Regnerus and Glen Elder
Jr. demonstrate that when youth from low-income neighborhoods
attend church, their academic performance improves.
The study, commissioned by the Center for Research on Religion
and Urban Civil Society, relied on data from the National Longitudinal
Study of Adolescent Health to examine the relationship between
religion and academics in nearly 10,000 students. Regnerus and
Elder found that the poorer the neighborhood, the more church
attendance helped kids to improve academically. The findings
held true even after controlling for obvious influences like
a student's relationship with parents.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2002/006/8.60.html
 Also from Barna Research, "Basic
Understanding of Evangelism" Study (1994)
" 9 out of 10 American adults (86%) cannot accurately define
the meaning of the "Great Commission."
" 7 out of 10 adults have no clue what "John 3:16"
means.
" Barely one third of all adults (31%) know the meaning
of the expression "the gospel."
" Only 4% of adults could define the "Great Commission,"
quote John 3:16, and define "the gospel."
Top Ten Reasons to Attend a Church Service
" #1 the theological beliefs and doctrine of the church
" #2 how much the people seem to care about each other
" #3 the quality of the sermons that are preached
" #4 how friendly the people in the church are to visitors
" #5 how involved the church is in helping poor and disadvantaged
people
" #6 the quality of the programs and classes for children
" #7 how much you like the pastor
" #8 the denomination the church is affiliated with
" #9 the quality of the adult Sunday school classes
" #10 the convenience of the times of their weekend services
" At least half of the unchurched audience found each of
the following to be compelling reasons to return to church: learning
more about God, getting religious training for their children,
improving their personal understanding of the contents of the
bible, meeting other people, and discovering ways of handling
daily challenges more appropriately or effectively. (1995)
Experiencing God
" Enjoying or appreciating worship is not synonymous with
experiencing the presence of God. Nearly two-thirds of regular
attenders say they have never experienced God's presence at a
church service. (1997)
" 48% of regular church attenders have not experienced God's
presence in the past year. (1997)
EXCERPTS from a 2001-2003
Barna Research Study
on Children's Ministry, Churches and Faith Formation
Read the full report and/or order the Barna Reasearch book
at http://www.barna.org/cgi-bin/PagePressRelease.asp?PressReleaseID=153&Reference=F
Research Shows That Spiritual Maturity Process Should Start
at a Young Age
November 17, 2003
(Ventura, CA)- Three years of research regarding ministry to
children has revealed many surprising outcomes, according to
a new book by researcher George Barna. In discussing that volume,
entitled Transforming Your Children Into Spiritual Champions,
Barna indicated that the wealth of research not only changed
his personal perspective on the importance of ministering to
young children, but also clarified why churches struggle to have
significance in our culture.
“Adults essentially carry out the beliefs they embraced
when they were young,” he explained.
Reaching People When They’re Young
Barna’s research discovered that a person’s lifelong
behaviors and views are generally developed when they are young
– particularly before they reach the teenage years.
First, a person’s moral foundations are generally in
place by the time they reach age nine. ... fundamental
perspectives on truth, integrity, meaning, justice, morality,
and ethics are formed quite early in life. After their first
decade, most people simply refine their views as they age without
a wholesale change in those leanings.
Second, a person’s response to the meaning and personal
value of Jesus Christ’s life, death and resurrection is
usually determined before a person reaches eighteen. In fact,
a majority of Americans make a lasting determination about the
personal significance of Christ’s death and resurrection
by age 12.
Third, Barna showed data indicating that in most cases people’s
spiritual beliefs are irrevocably formed when they are pre-teens.
“In essence,” the researcher noted, “what you
believe by the time you are 13 is what you will die believing.
.....research revealed that adult church leaders usually have
serious involvement in church life and training when they are
young. ......One implication is that the individuals who will
become the church’s leaders two decades from now are probably
active in church programs today.
Families and Churches Working Together
...Barna stated that the research underscored the importance
of families, not churches, taking the lead in the spiritual development
of children. “In situations where children became mature
Christians we usually found a symbiotic partnership between
their parents and their church,”
...Barna’s firm concluded that churches experiencing
great influence in children’s lives were motivated by the
realization that children are of special significance to God.
Consequently, those churches employed a long-term, multi-pronged
strategy that they tirelessly executed to facilitate the spiritual
growth of children.
...at a typical Protestant church, more than four out of every
ten people ministered to during the week are children, yet
seven out of every eight ministry dollars are spent on adults.
.....but the more important resource is the commitment of
adults to the spiritual wholeness of the children – which
means sacrificing some of the emphasis upon the ministry to adults.”
Book Challenges Prevailing Notions
The researcher admitted that the outcome of his studies produced
a significant turnabout in his own views about ministry. “Since
I became a Christian two decades ago, I have always accepted
the dominant notion: the most important ministry is that conducted
among adults. But the overwhelming evidence we have seen of the
huge impact in the lives of kids and the relatively limited changes
in the lives of adults has completely revolutionized my view
of ministry. I have concluded that children are the single most
important population group for the Church to focus upon.
Read the full report and/or order the Barna Reasearch book
at http://www.barna.org/cgi-bin/PagePressRelease.asp?PressReleaseID=153&Reference=F
D.A.R.E. Doesn't Work
Published: Tuesday, February 16, 1999
Author: Kendra E. Wright
Source: San Francisco Examiner
DRUG CZAR Barry McCaffrey announced last week a plan to cut drug
use in half by 2007. His goal - getting mentors and role models
more active in the lives of kids - is laudable. But drug education
and prevention will never succeed as long as D.A.R.E. - the Drug
Abuse Resistance Education program - is ensconced in 70 percent
of our children's schools. Over the last five years, studies
have been conducted for the federal General Accounting Office
and Justice Department and for the California Department of Education.
They describe how D.A.R.E. and other anti-drug programs fail
to reach the teenagers most at risk of drug abuse. Joel Brown
of Berkeley-based Educational Research Consultants was hired
by the state Department of Education to conduct one of the most
extensive qualitative studies of drug education programs to date.
He found that D.A.R.E. and other programs may actually be hurting
our kids. Brown's conclusions - eloquently articulated for him
by the teens he interviewed - were so disturbing that in 1995
the state education agency buried the report. (The findings became
public in 1997 when published in the prestigious Education Evaluation
and Policy Review Journal.)
http://www.familywatch.org/library/de.002.html
Update: Some D.A.R.E. programs have been dropped by local
communities. Others have been revamped. The jury is still out.
 Invited article for the Reformed Review, 2000, 53 (2),
119-126.
ON ASSESSING PRAYER, FAITH, AND HEALTH
David G. Myers
Several new studies find the religiosity-longevity correlation
among men alone, and even more strongly among women.8 One study
that followed 5,286 Californians over twenty-eight years found
frequent religious attendees 36 percent less likely to have died
in any year after controlling for age, gender, ethnicity, and
education. Another followed 3,968 elderly North Carolinians for
six years. It found that 23 percent of those attending religious
services at least weekly had died, as had 37 percent of infrequent
attendees.9 A "National Health Interview Survey" followed
21, 204 people over eight years. After controlling for age, sex,
race, and region, nonattenders were 1.87 times more likely to
have died than were those attending more than weekly.10 This
translated into a life expectancy at age twenty of eighty-three
years for frequent attenders and seventy-five years for infrequent
attenders.
http://www.davidmyers.org/religion/faith.html
Indiana Univ funded study of youth
Showed that non-religious students were twice as likely to use
drugs, alcohol and engage in binge drinking.
http://www.indiana.edu/~engs/articles/religion2.htm
Journal of Gerontology: Medical Sciences on a study conducted
in N. Carolina by Duke.
Findings: Depressed patients with higher intrinsic religiosity
scores had 70% more rapid remissions than patients with lower
scores. In this study, greater intrinsic religiosity independently
predicted shorter time to remission. To the authors' knowledge,
this is the first report in which religiosity has been examined
as a predictor of outcome of depressive disorder.
Findings: Persons who "prayed or studied the Bible at
least several times/week" were 58% less likely than others
to have alcoholism in past 6 months (OR 0.42, 95% CI 0.22-0.78,
p<.01 after controlling for age, sex, race, SES, and health
status); no difference was found for life-time rates. Those who
"attended religious services weekly or more" were 71%
less likely to have alcoholism in past 6 months
http://www.dukespiritualityandhealth.org/pastreports.html#attendance
 From The Psychiatric Times...
Dr. Larson, president of the National Institute for Healthcare
Research and adjunct professor in the department of psychiatry
and behavioral science at Duke University Medical Center and
Northwestern University Medical School.
National Institute for Healthcare Research (1999),
surveyed almost 14,000 youths and found that the analysis of
six measures of religious commitment and eight measures of substance
abuse revealed religious commitment was linked with less drug
abuse. The measure of "importance of religion" was
the best predictor in indicating lack of substance abuse. The
authors stated, "This implies that the controls operating
here are deeply internalized values and norms rather than…fear…or
peer pressure."
A study of the religious lives of alcoholics found that 89%
of alcoholics had lost interest in religion during their teen-age
years, whereas 48% among the community control group had
increased interest in religion, and 32% had remained unchanged
(Larson and Wilson, 1980). Alcoholics often report negative experiences
with religion and hold concepts of God that are punitive, rather
than loving and forgiving (Gorsuch, 1993).
Furthermore, a relationship between religious/spiritual commitment
and the non-use or moderate use of alcohol has been documented.
Amoateng and Bahr (1986) reported that, whether or not a religious
tradition specifically proscribes alcohol use, those who are
active in a religious group consumed substantially less alcohol
than those who are not active.
How significantly might religious commitment prevent suicide?
One early large-scale study found that people who did not attend
church were four times more likely to kill themselves than were
frequent church-goers (Comstock and Partridge, 1972). Stack (1983)
found rates of church attendance predicted suicide rates more
effectively than any other evaluated factor, including unemployment.
http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/p001078.html
The researchers studied data gathered through
Monitoring the Future, the University of North Carolina's four year
nationally representative
survey of high school seniors. Among specific findings
were that especially religious youths were less likely to smoke,
drink and use drugs and more likely to start later and use less
if they started at all, he said. They went to bars less often,
received fewer traffic tickets, wore seat belts more, took fewer
risks and fought less frequently. Shoplifting, other thefts,
trespassing and arson also were rarer.
"Religious 12th-graders argued with parents less, skipped
school less, exercised more, participated more in student government
and faced fewer detentions, suspensions and expulsions,"
Smith said.
Lilly Endowment Inc. is funding the four-year study, which
began in 2001. Among the researchers' goals are to identify effective
practices in the religious, moral and social formation in young
people's lives and to foster informed national discussions about
the influence of religion on adolescents.
http://monitoringthefuture.org/
View a listing of research results pertinent
to our topic at
http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/dec02/smith120302.html
October 28, 2002
WASINGTON (RNS)--Teenagers who attend church, have strong religious
beliefs and participate in church-sponsored youth activities
are more likely than their less-religious peers to avoid risky
behavior, according to a new study.
The report, released in late September by the National Study
of Youth and Religion, studied U.S. 12th graders and found a
strong correlation between religion and avoiding delinquent activity.
"The report demonstrates that religion among U.S. 12th
graders is positively related to participation in constructive
youth activities," said the study's principal investigator,
Christian Smith. Smith, a professor and associate chair of sociology
at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where the
study was based, and his researchers examined data from Monitoring
the Future, a national survey of U.S. high school students. Religious
seniors, the study found, are less likely to "use, sell
or be offered drugs." While 61.3 percent of non-churchgoing
12th graders reported using illegal drugs in the previous year,
only 38.5 percent of those who attend church frequently said
they had. Tobacco and alcohol use was lower among religious teens
as well. Only 11.9 percent of frequent churchgoers said they
used cigarettes, while almost three times as many of their non-churchgoing
peers smoke regularly. Half of those who rated religion as "very
important" had never been drunk, compared to 30.5 percent
of those who said religion is not important to them.
In addition, the study reports, religious teens:
___Are safer behind the wheel.
___Are less attracted to danger and risky situations.
___Are less prone to violence and criminal behavior.
___Have less trouble in school and with their parents.
___Are more involved in sports, community activities and volunteer
work.
___While the researchers said there is a strong link between
religion and positive, healthy behavior in teens, it is difficult,
they wrote, to "determine the direction of cause and effect
between religion and risk behaviors and social activities."
___Possible factors in the link might be the influence of religion
itself or that some families are predisposed to avoid risky behavior
and engage in religious activities.
Church Attendance Improves Community Volunteerism among
Young People
The relationship between religiosity and community engagement
extends beyond voting to other aspects of civic activity, such
as volunteering -- 73% of 18 to 24 year olds who attend
religious services every week have volunteered with a community
or religious organization in the past few years, compared to
40% of those who attend religious services less frequently.
Quoted from the National Assoc. of Secretaries of State, Voting
Survey, Attitudes Among Youth.
http://www.stateofthevote.org/survey/sect4.htm
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