No matter how healthy you might be, no matter how wonderful a life you lead, it will eventually end in death. This is not a condemnation, nor a morbid idea, but simply a truth of life. Death is not something today's society takes lightly. Millions of dollars are spent each year in efforts to slow the aging process, and the inevitable approach of death. Many would affirm that their greatest fear is what happens when they are not able to live any longer. The real fear seems to lie, not in the turmoil brought on by the end of this life, but what (if anything) happens afterward. Do we spiral off into a meaningless void until the end of time, or is there something else, something more waiting for us on the other side of the dark tunnel? For most people, the answer to this question depends on spirituality. Research has shown time and time again, that belief in some sort of higher power is linked to faster healing from sickness or injury, greater satisfaction and peace in life, and now, a greater acceptance of and peace about the journey toward death.
John Maltby and Liza Day based their research on the previous findings that one's religion does have an effect on one's perception of death. Going one step further, Maltby and Day attempted to tweeze apart intrinsic and extrinsic motivations for the religion with which their subjects identified themselves. The research for this study was performed with reference to the Death Obsession Scale, introduced by Abdel-Khalek in 1998. This scale was designed to measure three variables: death anxiety, death depression, and death distress. Although anxiety, depression, and distress with regards to death are more frequently experienced among the elderly, the subjects were 156 undergraduate students, mostly of Christian faith. The chosen religion of the subjects was measured using Allport and Ross' Religious Orientation Scale (19670), which was designed to measure the constructs of intrinsic, extrinsic-personal, and extrinsic-social orientation toward religion.
Significant results were found showing that the more intrinsically one's religion was oriented, the less obsessed with death he or she tended to be. The opposite conclusions were made about both extrinsic-social and extrinsic-personal orientations toward religion, as a positive correlation was found between each construct and death obsession. Maltby and Day were ultimately able to conclude that death obsession is significantly correlated with religious orientation.
A study done at the University of Singapore by Xu Jianbin and Kalyani K. Mehta examined the differences between Buddhism and Christianity and the role each religion plays in the aging process. The style of research was in-depth interviews of 40 residents of Singapore, half were Christian and half Buddhist. Jianbin and Mehta's hypothesis was based on the stance that the secondary activities and benefits of organized religion are what actually cause greater satisfaction in later life, which leads to less overall anxiety, greater health, and less concern about death. Secondary activities of organized religion include prayer or recitation of mantras and social gatherings of one's church or temple, combined with time spent within one's faith based community.
The responses from the interviews, combined with research into the theological positions of both Buddhism and Christianity, revealed that members of each faith possess a strong belief in the power of religious healing. Christian interviewees reported that their healings were due, in large part, to their trust in God's power. Buddhists tended to rely on the presence of the Buddha of Medicine, who was sought through the chanting of his name. Jianbin and Mehta suggest that it is perhaps the peace of mind brought about by the strong faith of the interviewees, which boosted their recuperative abilities, creating some sort of placebo phenomenon. A similar approach was taken with regards to the problematic loneliness experienced by aging individuals. An overwhelming majority of those interviewed reported that their religion had somehow reduced loneliness. The credit for such a reduction is given, not to the actual presence of a relationship with a higher being, but to the social identity found when one attaches oneself to a religion. In other words, it was the religious oriented, community building activities, and not necessarily the presence of Buddha or God, that reduced the loneliness of these elderly individuals.
The conclusion of the research was that the Buddhists and Christians were equally unlikely to fear death. In fact, not one of the respondents admitted to fearing death. An explanation was ventured that both Christianity and Buddhism offer alternatives to sinking into the meaningless void after death by offering the promise of afterlife, which provides hope, stability, and permanence.
The fear of death is induced though a number of different variables. One such variable is the concern of not having made a difference, of leaving without contributing anything of substance for the benefit future generations. In 2003, Michelle Dillon, Paul Wink, and Kristen Fay performed new analyses on old data from a longitudinal study of 183 Americans born in the 1920's. The focus of their study was to more clearly understand the relationship between religiousness, spirituality, and generativity. The first task was to operationally define religion and spirituality so that the difference between the two could be utilized in interpreting the data (collected through both self report and observation). The "religious" scale consisted of the tendency to accept authority, and to settle in established institutions. Those who scored high on the religious scale tended to connect to their God (about eighty percent of respondents identified the Judeo-Christian God) through prayer and public, communal worship. On the other hand, the "spiritual" scale was based on the tendency to shun tradition and external authority in terms of faith doctrines, seeing the sacred as residing within whichever medium it is sought.
The in-depth data analyses for this study show interactions between almost countless variables including religiousness, spirituality, social class, gender, and cohort. Among the results, some key conclusions were made. First, both religiousness and spirituality showed positive correlation with generativity. Second, religion was found do correlate with different subscales for generativity (altruism, givingness, and prosocial competence) than was spirituality (productivity, impact on others, creative endeavors). These results show that both religion and spirituality influence the degree to which a person cares about/ contributes to future generations, creating for them a more satisfactory life view, and theoretically, less anxiety about death.
The three studies discussed above each focus on a different aspect of how one's faith affects views of the aging process and eventual death. It seems to be an unarguable fact that faith, religion, spirituality, whatever you wan to call it, affects how mankind perceives this life as well as the next. Nobody can be sure exactly what occurs when life as we know it ends, for we are still alive and there has not yet been discovered a way to poll the dead. Religion seems to provide a means for some to deal with this uncertainty, something with which to answer the nagging questions of doubt. Perhaps the information in these studies can shed some light into why faith in a higher power is such a vital part of our culture.
Dillon, M., Wink, P., & Fay K. (2003). Is spirituality detrimental to generativity?. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 42(3), 427-442.
Jianbin, X., & Mehta, K. K. (2003). The effects of religion on subjective aging in singapore: an interreligions comparison. Journal of Aging Studies, 17(4), 485-502.
Maltby, J., & Day, L. (2000). Religious orientation and death obsession. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 161(1), 122-124.
A Medical Doctor's View of Religion and the Aging Process (http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-19931101-000028.html)
Religion, Senescence, and Mental Health (http://ajgponline.org/cgi/content/full/10/4/386)
Research From the Center for Aging, Religion, and Spirituality (http://aging-religion-spirituality.com/content/view/15/35/1/3/)
Contributed by Jenny Slager, February 18, 2006.