Association of self-reported religiosity and mortality in industrial employees: the CORDIS study

Kraut, Allen; Melamed, Samuel; Gofer, D; Froom, Paul

doi:10.1016/s0277-9536(03)00282-x

Cited by 11 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Tables summarizing the 36 articles that were included are available from the first author [23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,43,44,45,46,47,48,49,50,51,52,53,54,55,56,57,58,59]. Articles were excluded because they overlapped in their study samples with articles that were included [60,61,62,63,64,65,66,67], because they did not include a relevant spirituality/religiosity predictor variable [68,69,70,71,72,73,74,75,76,77,78], or because the outcome was not assessed in terms of mortality [79,80,81].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Religiosity/Spirituality and Mortality

Chida

Steptoe

Powell

2009

Psychother Psychosom

300

137

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Background: The relationship between religiosity/spirituality and physical health has been the subject of growing interest in epidemiological research. We systematically reviewed prospective observational cohort studies of the association between this potentially protective psychological factor and mortality using meta-analytic methods. Methods: We searched general bibliographic databases: Medline, PsycINFO, Web of Science and PubMed (up to 20 March, 2008). Two reviewers independently extracted data on study characteristics, quality, and estimates of associations. Random effects meta-analyses, subgrouping, and sensitivity analysis were performed. Results: There were 69 studies (28 articles) and 22 studies (11 articles) investigating the association between religiosity/spirituality and mortality in initially healthy populations and diseased populations, respectively. The results of the meta-analyses showed that religiosity/spirituality was associated with reduced mortality in healthy population studies (combined hazard ratio = 0.82, 95% CI = 0.76–0.87, p <0.001), but not in diseased population studies (combined hazard ratio = 0.98, 95% CI = 0.94–1.01, p = 0.19). Notably, the protective effect of religiosity/spirituality in the initially healthy population studies was independent of behavioral factors (smoking, drinking, exercising, and socioeconomic status), negative affect, and social support. We divided studies according to the aspects of religiosity/spirituality measure examined, and found that organizational activity (e.g. church attendance) was associated with greater survival in healthy population studies. Multi-dimensional aspects were related to survival in both the healthy and diseased populations. Religiosity/spirituality was negatively associated with cardiovascular mortality in healthy population studies. Conclusions: The current review suggests that religiosity/spirituality has a favorable effect on survival, although the presence of publication biases indicates that results should be interpreted with caution.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Religiosity/Spirituality and Mortality

Chida

Steptoe

Powell

2009

Psychother Psychosom

300

137

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“…Second, we know very little about the religious identity of these respondents—that is, where they fall on the familiar spectrum of Israeli Jewish affiliation (i.e., secular, traditional, religious, ultra-Orthodox). In a few recent studies of religion and well-being in Israel, such a measure has been available, enabling useful comparisons (e.g., Kraut et al, 2004; Levav, Koh, & Billig, 2008; Levin, 2011b; Shmueli, 2007; Van Praag et al, 2010). This was not possible in the ESS data.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Associations with psychological distress (e.g., Lupo & Strous, 2011; Wang, Lederman, Andrade, & Gorenstein, 2008) and physical health (e.g., Anson, Antonovsky, & Sagy, 1990; Shmotkin, 1990) have been less consistent, with nonsignificant and even inverse findings present, some of this perhaps due to the potential confounding among measures of public religious participation, age, and functional health status. Sophisticated mortality studies conducted in Israel, however, do indicate a significant long-term survival advantage for more religious Jews (Kark et al, 1996; Litwin, 2007), although age or cohort differences in the salience and even directionality of this association have been observed (Kraut, Melamed, Gofer, & Froom, 2004).…”

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confidence: 99%

Religious behavior, health, and well-being among Israeli Jews: Findings from the European Social Survey.

Levin

2013

Psychology of Religion and Spirituality

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This study investigates the relationship between religious behavior and health status and psychological well-being in a population sample of Israeli Jewish adults (N ϭ 1,849). Using data from the Israeli sample of the European Social Survey, measures of synagogue attendance and private prayer were examined in relation to single-item indicators of subjective and functional health, happiness, and life satisfaction and to a three-item scale tapping into the somatic dimension of well-being. Bivariately, the religious, health, and well-being measures are mostly related, and in a salutary direction, but multivariable analyses revealed that these associations are more nuanced. Specifically, after age-adjustment and controls for effects of various sociodemographic characteristics, including Israeli nativity, synagogue attendance is associated with greater happiness only, whereas prayer is associated with greater happiness and life satisfaction and higher scores on the well-being scale. Additionally, prayer is significantly associated with functional health, but in an inverse direction, suggesting its use as a coping resource in response to physical or functional challenges or impairments. These latter results are supported by supplemental analyses of the well-being indicators, which also adjust for possible exogenous or moderating effects of functional health. These findings contribute to current streams of empirical research on the putative influence of Jewish religious observance on physical and mental health and psychological well-being in Israel and the Jewish diaspora.

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“…A 12-year follow up study in industrial 3,638 Jewish Israeli males demonstrated that religiosity had a protective effect on mortality in younger employees, but the reverse was true for older employees (total number) [44]. 5 The Hebrew word for healing (napha, ‫ָא‬ ‫פ‬ ‫)רָ‬ can refer not just to physical healing, but to spiritual healing: Ps.…”

Section: Mortalitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Religious and Spiritual Biomarkers in Both Health and Disease

Kharitonov¹

2012

Religions

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Religious thought and spirituality can be considered as a part of natural human capacities. There is an exponential rise in clinical research in the relationship between religion, spirituality and positive health outcomes. Most of these studies, however, have been primarily descriptive, rather than explanatory, focusing on identifying their underlying mechanisms. Almost no attempts have been made to find novel methods to mirror and monitor positive, and possibly negative, reactions related to the local and general effects of religion and spirituality in healthy subjects and patients. As this area of interest is rather new, we propose to put forward a new hypothesis that effects of religion and spirituality can be objectively studied by various exhaled biomarkers, some of which have already been developed and tested in health and disease. The lungs are particularly well suited for this purpose, as we have easy access to exhaled air and thereby a possibility to develop methods that measure compounds directly released from them. This work is the first step in the convergence of medical and theological research by linking various biomarkers and physiological measures with indicators of individual belief systems, religiosity and spirituality.

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Association of self-reported religiosity and mortality in industrial employees: the CORDIS study

Cited by 11 publications

References 31 publications

Religiosity/Spirituality and Mortality

Religiosity/Spirituality and Mortality

Religious behavior, health, and well-being among Israeli Jews: Findings from the European Social Survey.

Religious and Spiritual Biomarkers in Both Health and Disease

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