Religiousness and responses to COVID-19
Citation: David AB, Park CL, Awao S, et al. Religiousness in the first year of COVID-19: A systematic review of empirical research. Current Research in Ecological and Social Psychology. 2023;4:100075.
Language: Abstract and full text available in EN.
Free to view: Yes.
Funding sources: Nothing noted.
What is this? In this systematic review, the authors searched for studies investigating the association of religion with individuals’ responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. They restricted their searches to articles published in English between January 2020 and January 2021. The authors found 137 qualitative studies. This systematic review was registered with PROSPERO, number CRD42021235938.
What was found: Religion affected many aspects of individuals’ responses to COVID-19. Religious coping generally led to favourable mental health and well-being; however, these results varied by geography, practice, and type of coping. Being religious was also associated with lower adherence to public health advice for COVID-19, greater belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories, and a lower perceived risk.
Implications: The authors of the review stated that longitudinal research was needed to disentangle the effects of religiousness, mental health, and well-being over time.
Other considerations: The authors of the review discussed their findings in the context of religion.
This summary was written by Isabelle Tahmazian, checked by Sneha Bhadti and finalized by William Summerskill.