Finally, interest in the connections between religion and health is also reflected in the general culture, with the publication of numerous books and newspaper and magazine articles ( 179A) written for general audiences.Īlthough these developments are noteworthy, it is important not to overstate the extent to which the research and practice communities endorse the proposition that religious involvement is significant for individual and population health. Furthermore, in the fields of health education and health promotion, the concepts of spirituality and spiritual health are discussed and incorporated into notions of overall health ( 8, 28, 177). In the area of clinical practice, several distinguished hospitals and health care centers have initiated programs incorporating religious/spiritual approaches and content as complements to standard treatment regimens, and a number of medical and nursing schools have begun to incorporate these issues into their curriculums ( 5, 112). In the health and medical sciences, there is growing recognition that religious and spiritual concerns are important for understanding health-related behaviors, attitudes, and beliefs and are particularly salient for persons whose health is compromised ( 6, 71). Whereas religion and health were once considered marginal to serious scientific inquiry, they are currently enjoying an unprecedented level of research interest and prominence. In recent years, several books have been published ( 69, 70, 105, 121, 124, 147, 151, 159) and major journals in public health and medicine have featured empirical research, literature reviews, and special issues on these and related topics ( 16, 39, 100, 103, 106, 121, 124, 130, 132, 175, 180). This period has seen ( a) development and expansion of systematic programs of research and inquiry, ( b) improvement in the quality of research and scholarship around these issues, and ( c) expansion of interest in this topic to diverse fields of research (e.g. In the past several years, systematic research on religious involvement and physical and mental health has begun to explore the functional mechanisms linking these constructs. Despite recognized methodological and analytical issues ( 39), overall the findings indicate a consistent and salutary influence of religious factors on individual and population health ( 110, 122). The relationship between religion and health has been of longstanding interest in the health, social, and behavioral sciences, spanning a period of >100 years ( 117, 121, 122, 123). Future research directions point to promising new areas of investigation that could bridge the constructs of religion and health. Investigations of religion and health have ethical and practical implications that should be addressed by the lay public, health professionals, the research community, and the clergy. Methodological and analytical advances in the field permit the development of more complex models of religion's effects, in keeping with proposed theoretical explanations. Recent research has validated the multidimensional aspects of religious involvement and investigated how religious factors operate through various biobehavioral and psychosocial constructs to affect health status through proposed mechanisms that link religion and health. Systematic programs of research investigate religious phenomena within the context of coherent theoretical and conceptual frameworks that describe the causes and consequences of religious involvement for health outcomes. ▪ AbstractResearch examining the relationships between religion and the health of individuals and populations has become increasingly visible in the social, behavioral, and health sciences.
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