Churchgoers Live Longer

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Robert Roy Britt
LiveScience Managing Editor
LiveScience.com
Mon Apr 3, 1:04 PM ET

There are many things you can do to increase your life expectancy: exercise, eat well, take your medication and ... go to church.

A new study finds people who attend religious services weekly live longer. Specifically, the research looked at how many years are added to life expectancy based on:

Regular physical exercise: 3.0-to-5.1 years
Proven therapeutic regimens: 2.1-to-3.7 years
Regular religious attendance: 1.8-to-3.1 years

The role of religion

The study, which is actually a review of existing research from the three categories, does not reveal what the link between faith and health might be.

"Religious attendance is not a mode of medical therapy," said study leader Daniel Hall, a resident in general surgery at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. "While this study was not intended for use in clinical decision making, these findings tell us that there is something to examine further."

Hall is also an Episcopal priest.

"The significance of this finding may prove to be controversial," he said. "But at the very least, it shows that further research into the associations between religion and health might have implications for medical practice."

In a telephone interview, Hall speculated that the social aspect of religion could play a role in the results: "There is something about being knit into the type of community that religious communities embody that has a way of mediating a positive health effect," he told LiveScience. Perhaps, he said, being involved in a religion "can then decrease your level of stress in life or increase your ability to cope with stress."

Another possibility: "Being in a religious community helps you make meaning out of your life," Hall suggested.

The findings are detailed in the March-April issue of the Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine.

Cost-effective

Hall also looked at the cost of these three approaches, examining typical gym membership fees, therapy costs from health insurance companies and census data on average household contributions to religious institutions. The estimated cost of each year of additional life apparently gained by each method:

Regular physical exercise: $4,000
Proven therapeutic regimens: $10,000
Regular religious attendance: $7,000

Hall cautions that few conclusions can be drawn from his study, and that further research is needed. "There is no evidence that changing religious attendance causes a change in health outcomes," he said.

But he said doctors and researchers might want to think of religiousness as a demographic factor.

"For example," he writes in the journal, "the incidence of gastric cancer is higher among Japanese men, and knowledge of this fact might guide a physician to initiate early and frequent screening for gastric cancer among male Japanese patients."

That's totally true and everyone should believe it.

It does make sense. Much as I hate religion, I can't deny that it does have some positive effects. It helped blacks through slavery. Gives people hope. Makes them feel like they're a part of something. In that sense it's theraputic. In fact, I very much believe that one of the main reasons why so many people are religious in the first place is that it appeals to their hope for comfort and fear of being alone, and of dying.

The title of the article says: "Churchgoers Live Longer". Does it also apply to people who go to a synagogue, a mosque, a Buddhist temple, or any other house of worship? The study seems biased toward the Christian worshippers. I'm wondering if the same study would ahve the same results for other religions, such as Jews, Muslims, or Buddhists.

I think that the main point of the article may not be that 'churchgoers' in specific live longer, but that involving yourself socially in a community is what helps you live longer. There are other studies I have read about where the size of your social circle is correlated to longevity. The lonelier you are, the shorter you live. The more socially active you are, the longer you live.

http://chronicle.uchicago.edu/011115/loneliness.shtml

A reference to a future study, I could not find the other ones.

I've seen other studies in the past that suggested that people who attend services in other religions besides the Christian religion do live longer also.

For me personally, I feel a brotherhood among my fellow Christians that I do not feel when I am among the general populace. It's as though we Christians share something special together, and it also feels like we are all together on a spiritual journey.

LMAOROTF!! !

The person conducting the study is also a priest. Now there's an UNBIASED study for you. Suprised he did'nt find Episcopalian church to have the greatest benefit.

To date, I have not seen studies by athiests that state that being athiest helps people live longer.

Please update this thread when you obtain any article that says anything to that effect.

In the meantime, here is an article describing the same results regarding people who attend religious observances as observed by non-religious and religious people in the psychiatric field:

http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/p000832.html

Longevity and Mortality
by David B. Larson, M.D., M.S.P.H., Susan S. Larson, M.A.T., and Harold G. Koenig, M.D., M.H.Sc.

August 2000, Vol. XVII, Issue 8

Mortality research is finding that religious/spiritual commitment is a strong predictor of who lives longer, thus demonstrating a high relevance for addressing religious/spiritual commitment in clinical care. Several longitudinal studies are reviewed in this article.

Hummer et al. (1999) reported that attending religious services more than once a week was associated with an additional seven years of life. Tracking a national sample of more than 21,000 American adults for nine years, the investigators examined many socioeconomic, health and lifestyle factors, and religious attendance. Religious attendance was a strong predictor of survival, even when other relevant factors were taken into account. Might other factors such as higher income or education, stronger social ties, or better initial health or healthier lifestyles-such as avoiding cigarette smoking or excessive alcohol-explain the increased chance to live longer among those who were most actively religious?

Hummer and colleagues stated, "We find little evidence that religious attendance is associated with mortality only because of confounding by socioeconomic factors." Stronger social ties and better health behaviors did explain some of the link with living longer among the highly religious, but "a strong religious attendance effect remains."

Some causes of death appeared more frequently among people who did not attend religious services. "Those who never attend are about four times as likely to die from respiratory disease, diabetes, or infectious diseases," the researchers found. Although stronger social ties helped reduce the risks of diabetes, and healthier lifestyle choices lowered risk of death from respiratory and circulatory diseases, these factors did not fully account for the gap between very high attendees and nonattendees.

"Religious involvementýhas received far less attention in the mortality literature than socioeconomic status," the researchers noted. "Moreover there is still a sense in much of the scientific community that religious effects are minor at best or are even irrelevant. Our findings help to dispel such a notion."

In a longer-term longitudinal study (Strawbridge et al., 1997), at the 28-year follow-up of 5,286 people, those who attended religious services weekly or more were 25% less likely to die than infrequent attendees. Frequent attendees were also more likely to make healthier choices, quit smoking, increase exercising, expand social contacts and stay married.

Could these findings be simply explained by the interpretation that those in better health are more likely to attend religious services than those who are sick or disabled? According to the National Institute for Healthcare Research, the study found people "with significant impairment in mobility were, in fact, more likely to be frequent attendees."

In another mortality study (Oman and Reed, 1998), 1,931 people aged 55 years or older were followed for nearly five years. Some 454 of the sample died during that time. Attending religious service was one of the significant factors in predicting survival. "For each sex, weekly attendees had the lowest mortality and nonattendees had the highest mortality," Oman and Reed stated.

But would different activities or nonreligious social support have the same effects? Although substituting other social clubs for church failed to help people live longer, there was a complementary effect. People who engaged in volunteer work along with attending religious services were even more likely to live longer.

Oman and Reed (1998) analyzed an extensive range of factors that could affect health, which might explain why those attending religious services might live longer. These included demographics, chronic disease state, physical functioning and driving status, health habits, social participation in activities, marital status, health of spouse and having confidants, and psychological status.

"Even after controlling for six classes of potential confounding and intervening variables, we were unable to explain the protection against mortality offered by religious attendance," Oman and Reed concluded. They noted their findings support other research that showed attending religious services was linked with lower blood pressure, lower death rates from cardiovascular disease, less depression, and less earlier death from various causes.

Even after considering key health and social factors, a recent study found chances to live longer expanded by 28% for older Americans when they attended religious meetings each week (Koenig et al., 1999). The researchers noted: "Older adults, particularly women, who attend religious services at least once a week appear to have a survival advantage over those attending services less frequently."

The study, part of the Established Populations for the Epidemiologic Studies of the Elderly program of the National Institutes of Health, surveyed a random sample of nearly 4,000 seniors aged 64 and older living in North Carolina to see if attending religious services had any bearing on living longer. The seniors were interviewed every year up to six years. Like the aforementioned studies, demographic, socioeconomic and health factors were taken into account.

Death rates among this sample were relatively high during the six years (29.7%) which provided "substantial power for examining predictors of survival," the researchers noted. Attending religious services stood out as a significant factor predicting survival.

"Analyses revealed that the risk of dying for frequent attendees was 46% lower than for those attending less often," the study noted. Also, "Religious attendees were physically healthier, had more social support, and lived healthier lifestyles than less-frequent attendees."

After adjusting for factors that could help foster longer lives, frequent attendees were still 28% less likely to have died during the six years. Women had a 35% lower risk of death after controlling for other factors, compared to a 17% lower risk for men in this study. Other studies have found women are more likely than men to pray, rate religion as important in their lives and depend on religion to cope with life's stresses. This may convey greater health benefits.

"Religious attendance is related to lower rates of depression, anxiety and stress...Lower rates of depression, like higher social support, may translate into stronger immune systems and better defenses against disease," the researchers commented.

In fact, a pioneering study of more than 1,700 older people (Koenig et al., 1997) found that people who attended church to any degree were only half as likely as nonattendees to have elevated levels of a blood protein that can reveal problems in immune system functioning.

High levels of interleukin-6 (IL-6) are linked with unstable immune functioning, perhaps indicating that the body is more susceptible to a variety of diseases. The researchers noted that high levels of stress are associated with the release of hormones such as cortisol and IL-6. If religious commitment improved handling stress, as indicated in other study findings, then religious commitment might also be associated with the reduced release of cortisol and other substances that adversely affect immune functioning.

The study found a relationship between low religious attendance and high levels of IL-6 that could not be explained by other controlled-for variables, including greater rates of depression or more frequent negative life events.

"This finding provides some support for the hypothesis that older adults who frequently attend religious services have healthier immune systems," Koenig and colleagues concluded.

Dr. Larson is 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.

Ms. Larson is a science journalist, co-author of The Forgotten Factor in Physical and Mental Health: What Does the Research Show? and writes "Research Reports" for the National Institute for Healthcare Research.

Dr. Koenig is associate professor of psychiatry and associate professor of medicine at Duke University.


References
Hummer RA, Rogers RG, Nam CB, Ellison CG (1999), Religious involvement and U.S. adult mortality. Demography 36(2):273-285.

Koenig HG, Cohen HJ, George LK et al. (1997), Attendance at religious services, interleukin-6, and other biological parameters of immune function in older adults. Int J Psychiatry Med 27(3):233-250.

Koenig HG, Hays JC, Larson DB et al. (1999), Does religious attendance prolong survival?: A six-year follow-up study of 3,968 older adults. J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci 54(7):M370-M376.

Oman D, Reed D (1998), Religion and mortality among the community-dwelling elderly. Am J Public Health 88(10):1469-1475.

Strawbridge WJ, Cohen RD, Shema SJ, Kaplan GA (1997), Frequent attendance at religious services and mortality over 28 years. Am J Public Health 87(6):957-961.

I bet you can find equally well writen "research" on pfreenology

Prayers found ineffective in speeding recovery

(Not that newscientist is the greatest source, but I just happened to notice it today.)

Well, when a study says "religious people live longer" or "atheists live longer", just about anyone can say "it just seems longer". After all, life is short, so you need to enjoy it while it lasts. Here are some instructions I think people should really follow.
1) Read the Bible, the Torah, the Koran, or whatever else motivates you.
2) Be nice to others; their life is just as short as yours.
3) Believe in the afterlife if it comforts you, but remember that this life is your responsibility.
4) Take care of yourself; life is short as it is, so don't make it any shorter.
5) Visit a place that inspires you, whether it's religious, scenic, or historical.
6) Spend time in the company of people who bring out the best in you.

How about:

1. Read the works of Hume. Avoid the evil opium of the masses.
2. Lobby your politicians to have believers incarcerated in mental institutions.
3. Realise that there is no afterlife and devote your life to convincing others of this fact, especially frail old women who's only glimmer of hope in life was seeing their loved ones again.
4. Since death is the ultimate ending, grasp onto life like a coke addict to his stash, even if this means letting 5-year-olds die so you can get that heart transplant for your wrinkly 80-year-old ass.
5. Encourage the demolition of historic religious buildings and their redevelopment into shopping malls. You're really doing people a favour by removing the focus of their dellusions, and it's a more efficient use of the space.
6. Find like-minded people with whom you can cooperate to further goals 1-5. This can easily be done by joining the Evil Atheist Conspiricy.

(Tongue firmly in cheek, for the humour-impared)

Look, what do most people do when a mormon visits them? That's right, pleasantly say your busy and shut the door on them because you find them boring. Well that's what god's doing with religious people, keeping them out of heaven for as long as possible so that he can get a break from all their self-rightous twittering on.

Either that or 'God' finds all the self righteuous sniveling to be uproariously hilarious, and wants the show to continue.

For the past year or so, I've had this urge to ask itinerant Je$u$ People if there was any real differance between suffering for all eternity in hell after trying to enjoy life, or spending the rest of eternity in heaven with a$$holes like them after leading a guilt ridden life. --Strangely enough, the opportunity hasn't presented itself, and I live in South Carolina.