S01E32 - Throw BABE Out With the Bathwater? Canadian Atheists Are No Less Healthy than the Religious

This study by David Speed challenges the belief-as-benefit effect (BABE), which traditionally suggests that religious individuals experience better health than the nonreligious. By analyzing a large Canadian dataset, the researcher compared health indicators such as stress, life satisfaction, and mental well-being across various groups, including atheists, agnostics, and theists. The results demonstrated that atheists reported health parity with religious participants, finding no significant "penalty" for a lack of faith. Even when comparing maximally religious individuals to maximally nonreligious ones, the observed differences were statistically trivial or non-existent. Ultimately, the author suggests that worldview commitment and social factors may be more influential than the specific content of religious belief. These findings imply that the long-held narrative of religion being inherently salutary is likely overstated or inaccurate within the Canadian context.Citation:Speed, David. 2022. “Throw BABE Out With the Bathwater? Canadian Atheists Are No Less Healthy than the Religious.” Journal of Religion and Health 61:4608–34. doi:10.1007/s10943-022-01558-w.