Changes in Spiritual but Not Religious Identity and Well-Being in Emerging Adulthood in the United States: Pathways to Health Sameness?

The "spiritual but not religious" (SBNR) are a growing group in the religious landscape of the United States. Thousands of studies to date have been devoted to the study of religion and health, but far less attention has been given to the study of the "spiritual but not religious." In this study, we address this gap by using two waves of longitudinal data from the National Study of Youth and Religion (2005-2008). We assess whether within-person changes in SBNR identity are associated with health and mental health in emerging adulthood and consider several pathways that may account for observed differences. Results suggest that consistently identifying as SBNR was associated with worse physical and mental health relative to youth that were consistently religious. Using parametric mediation analyses, we found evidence that three of our four proposed mediators (religious attendance, sense of closeness to God, and religious doubt, but not life meaning) partially explained these mental health differences. This study therefore makes an important advance in assessing the health implications of (non)-religion/spirituality early in the life course.