College students active in their faith have better mental health

September 5, 2024

Brigham Young University researchers are saying that new data confirms that religious campus environments can be a mentally healthy place, even for diverse student populations.

The Deseret News reports that BYU researchers Justin Dyer and Jenet Erickson compared student anxiety and suicide ideation across different kinds of campus environments and student characteristics.

Their study, published in the December 2023 Journal of Affective Disorders, drew upon the 2021 Healthy Minds dataset of 135,344 students across 140 universities.

Among the interesting patterns that emerged was the finding that there were “certain benefits of being on a religious university campus even when a student’s personal religiousness is low.” For instance, the study revealed that suicidal ideation of students with no religion was lower at a religious university than at a non-religious school.

Dyer told the Deseret News that “a religious campus tends to be protective” and that, in terms of mental health, even sexual and gender minorities did better at religious schools compared with non-religious schools.

The researchers also found that a student’s personal commitment to faith was an important variable for their mental health.

Dyer stated that “pressure to change and unmoor from religious principles, would seem to put more students at risk. As well meaning as some of these efforts are, they may do harm if they detach people from their religion.”

Photo: top, Credit: Scott G. Winterton/Deseret News