Religion a tonic for Teens
By LAURA SESSIONS STEPP
THE WASHINGTON POST
Last Updated: March 27, 2004, 10:53:12 AM PST
Here's a crazy idea: After all our ambitious child-rearing with Discovery toys, Suzuki piano lessons, conflict-avoidance classes, 4 a.m. swim practices, SAT prep classes, driver education and summer flights to study folk music in the Republic of Georgia, we might have done as well (and saved a lot of money) by just sending our kids to church, temple or mosque.
Late last year, a commission convened by Dartmouth Medical School, among others, studied years of research on kids, including brain-imaging studies, and concluded that young people who are religious are better off in significant ways than their secular peers. They are less likely than nonbelievers to smoke and drink and more likely to eat well; less likely to commit crimes and more likely to wear seat belts; less likely to be depressed and more likely to be satisfied with their families and school.
"Religion has a unique net effect on adolescents above and beyond factors like race, parental education and family income," says Brad Wilcox, a University of Virginia sociologist and panel member. Poor children who are religious will do better than poor children who are not religious, he adds -- and in some cases better than nonreligious middle-class children.
Meanwhile, a social groundswell may be under way, as a larger proportion of teenagers than a decade ago say religion is important.
In 2001, about three out of five teenagers said religion was "pretty important" or "very important" to them -- a significant increase according to Child Trends, a research organization that analyzes federal data. The biggest jump occurred not among poor and unambitious teenagers -- the stereotyped believers -- but among young achievers who anticipated finishing four years of college.
Such teenagers have helped make a hit out of "Joan of Arcadia," a CBS show about a 15-year-old who talks to God; it has been renewed for a second season. They've sustained a decadelong growth in the number of high school Bible clubs to about 15,000. They are swelling the enrollment at Christian colleges at three times the rate of other degree-granting schools. Religion is getting bigger in teenagers' lives, and the Dartmouth panel's findings may suggest to some that it should.
Though one of its sponsors, the Institute for American Values, publishes a good bit about God and faith, the commission was no conclave of religious conservatives. It included professors and researchers at Harvard and UCLA medical schools, as well as experts on child-rearing practice, including T. Berry Brazelton, Robert Coles, Peter Benson and Michael Resnick.
The commission members said religious congregations benefit teenagers by affirming who they are, expecting a lot from them and giving them opportunities to show what they can do. These aren't earthshaking observations; as the panel noted, the same could be said of clubs, sports teams and other youth organizations (such as the YMCA, which helped fund the study). But what sets religious groups apart -- and makes a surprisingly big difference to kids, according to the panel -- is that they promote a "direct personal relationship with the divine."
Adolescents, said the Dartmouth group, are "hard-wired to connect" to people and God.
Panels of academics and medical practitioners don't usually refer to "the divine." But these experts couldn't ignore what the data suggested, in particular two things: Religion or spirituality may influence young people's brain circuits, reducing levels of the stress hormone cortisol, and personal devotion is twice as likely to protect them from risky behavior as it would adults.
"Their brains are changing, their relations with family, friends and the opposite sex are changing, and they're beginning to figure out what their purpose in the world will be," says Wilcox. "We know that people often turn to God in the midst of momentous changes. Adolescents are no different."
High school senior Kimbrey Pierce puts it more simply.
"God isn't just a part of my life, he's the whole thing. I like knowing he is making the best decisions for me. That way I don't worry too much."
Another senior, Andrew Flanigan, found the life he knew gone forever when his father abandoned the family when Andrew was in grade school. At his mother's insistence, Andrew took confirmation classes and there, for the first time, the full force of the Christian story, including the resurrection of Jesus, hit him.
"What really reached me is that God cared so much He gave up his son. That God could love me unconditionally like that was pretty amazing. It's the kind of love parents have for their kids -- or should have for their kids."
modbee.com |
