How decades of divorce helped erode religion
by Julie Zauzmer, Washington Post:
Two widely recognized trends in American society might have something to do with each other.
Divorce rates climbed to the highest levels ever in the 1980s, when about half of all marriages ended in divorce.
And in the present day, Americans are rapidly becoming less religious. Since 1972, the share of Americans who say they do not adhere to any particular religion has increased from 5 percent of the population to 25 percent.
Could those two trends be related? A new study from the Public Religion Research Institute says yes. The children of divorced parents have grown up to be adults of no religion.
People whose parents divorced when they were children are significantly more likely to grow up not to be religious as adults, the study found. Thirty-five percent of the children of divorced parents told pollsters they are now nonreligious, compared with 23 percent of people whose parents were married when they were children.
Related Posts
Tags
Share This
