Religiosity and Subjective Well-Being: An International Perspective

C. Kim-Prieto (ed.), Religion and Spirituality Across Cultures, Cross-Cultural Advancements in Positive Psychology 9, DOI 10.1007/978-94-017-8950-9_9, © Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014 Psychologists hotly debate whether religion enhances the subjective well-being (SWB) of individuals and societies. This issue becomes particularly salient considering that a substantial majority (68 % of people worldwide) of people say that religion is important in their daily lives (Diener, Tay, & Myers, 2011 ). Among skeptics and atheists, religion has been viewed as being irrelevant, or even pathological and socially detrimental (e.g., Dawkins, 2006 ; Hitchens, 2007 ). George Bernard Shaw, for instance, mocked that “a believer may be happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunk is happier than a sober man.” Countering this, some evolutionists have argued that religion is adaptive, nurturing morality and social cohesion, both of which are found to promote well-being (Wade, 2010 ; Wright, 2009 ). Nevertheless, even such prominent religious leaders as Martin Luther have argued that religion can bring suffering. Luther stated that “a religion that gives nothing, costs nothing, and suffers nothing, is worth nothing.” (cited in Rodrigues & Harding, 2009 , p. 133) Clearly, it is diffi cult to draw conclusions based on rhetoric alone. As such, we turn to growing scientifi c evidence for the religiosity-SWB link across societies and cultures. We review studies on religiosity and SWB published in the last Chapter 9 Religiosity and Subjective Well-Being: An International Perspective