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Using data from the World Values Survey covering the period from 1981 to 2008, this study examines trends in the strength of religious belief worldwide. At the country level, the most important predictors of current religiosity are high intelligence and a history of communist rule, both of which reduce religious belief. However, religiosity has been rising vigorously in the communist and excommunist countries during the surveyed period although religion is declining in most countries of non-communist Europe and East Asia. In addition to a history of communist rule, other factors associated with rising religiosity include high religiosity of young people relative to older people, high female relative to male religiosity, and a positive relationship between religiosity and fertility. In addition, religion tends to grow in countries in which less educated people are far more religious than those with higher education. Aside from the rebound of religion in the (ex)communist countries, the religiosity gap between the most advanced and the most backward nations has widened worldwide. The implications of these findings for the future of religion are discussed.
Key Words: Religious belief; Modernization; Secularization; desecularization; Education; World Values Survey; Differential fertility.
The role of religion in public life has diminished in Europe and most other advanced societies since the time of the Enlightenment in the 18th century, and personal religiosity appears to be less today than it has been in past centuries. Nevertheless, the secularizing trend is not universal, as demonstrated by the rise of organized religion in the United States since the late 18th century (Finke & Stark, 1993). Predictions by early 20th century intellectuals of the impending demise of religion have been premature. Religious belief persists to the present day even in advanced Western societies.
The two immediate questions about current trends are: (1) is there a (continuing) trend toward lower religiosity in the most advanced societies? (2) Are the less developed countries entering an era of secularization and declining religious belief that is similar to the developments in Europe during the last two centuries?
This study goes beyond the question of whether people are becoming more or less religious over time by examining the correlates and possible causes of the current trends. By specifying the conditions under which religion is likely to...