Religion changes the brain.
Image: Roger Branch
-
The Wisdom of Psychopaths
In this engrossing journey into the lives of psychopaths and their infamously crafty behaviors, the renowned psychologist Kevin Dutton reveals that there is a...
Read More »
The article, “Religious factors and hippocampal atrophy in late life,” by Amy Owen and colleagues at Duke University represents an important advance in our growing understanding of the relationship between the brain and religion. The study, published March 30 in PLoS One, showed greater atrophy in the hippocampus in individuals who identify with specific religious groups as well as those with no religious affiliation. It is a surprising result, given that many prior studies have shown religion to have potentially beneficial effects on brain function, anxiety, and depression.
A number of studies have evaluated the acute effects of religious practices, such as meditation and prayer, on the human brain. A smaller number of studies have evaluated the longer term effects of religion on the brain. Such studies, like the present one, have focused on differences in brain volume or brain function in those people heavily engaged in meditation or spiritual practices compared to those who are not. And an even fewer number of studies have explored the longitudinal effects of doing meditation or spiritual practices by evaluating subjects at two different time points.
In this study, Owen et al. used MRI to measure the volume of the hippocampus, a central structure of the limbic system that is involved in emotion as well as in memory formation. They evaluated the MRIs of 268 men and women aged 58 and over, who were originally recruited for the NeuroCognitive Outcomes of Depression in the Elderly study, but who also answered several questions regarding their religious beliefs and affiliation. The study by Owen et al. is unique in that it focuses specifically on religious individuals compared to non-religious individuals. This study also broke down these individuals into those who are born again or who have had life-changing religious experiences.
The results showed significantly greater hippocampal atrophy in individuals reporting a life-changing religious experience. In addition, they found significantly greater hippocampal atrophy among born-again Protestants, Catholics, and those with no religious affiliation, compared with Protestants not identifying as born-again.
The authors offer the hypothesis that the greater hippocampal atrophy in selected religious groups might be related to stress. They argue that some individuals in the religious minority, or those who struggle with their beliefs, experience higher levels of stress. This causes a release of stress hormones that are known to depress the volume of the hippocampus over time. This might also explain the fact that both non-religious as well as some religious individuals have smaller hippocampal volumes.
This is an interesting hypothesis. Many studies have shown positive effects of religion and spirituality on mental health, but there are also plenty of examples of negative impacts. There is evidence that members of religious groups who are persecuted or in the minority might have markedly greater stress and anxiety as they try to navigate their own society. Other times, a person might perceive God to be punishing them and therefore have significant stress in the face of their religious struggle. Others experience religious struggle because of conflicting ideas with their religious tradition or their family. Even very positive, life-changing experiences might be difficult to incorporate into the individual’s prevailing religious belief system and this can also lead to stress and anxiety. Perceived religious transgressions can cause emotional and psychological anguish. This “religious” and “spiritual pain” can be difficult to distinguish from pure physical pain. And all of these phenomena can have potentially negative effects on the brain.
Thus, Owen and her colleagues certainly pose a plausible hypothesis. They also cite some of the limitations of their findings, such as the small sample size. More importantly, the causal relationship between brain findings and religion is difficult to clearly establish. Is it possible, for example, that those people with smaller hippocampal volumes are more likely to have specific religious attributes, drawing the causal arrow in the other direction? Further, it might be that the factors leading up to the life-changing events are important and not just the experience itself. Since brain atrophy reflects everything that happens to a person up to that point, one cannot definitively conclude that the most intense experience was in fact the thing that resulted in brain atrophy. So there are many potential factors that could lead to the reported results. (It is also somewhat problematic that stress itself did not correlate with hippocampal volumes since this was one of the potential hypotheses proposed by the authors and thus, appears to undercut the conclusions.) One might ask whether it is possible that people who are more religious suffer greater inherent stress, but that their religion actually helps to protect them somewhat. Religion is frequently cited as an important coping mechanism for dealing with stress.
This new study is intriguing and important. It makes us think more about the complexity of the relationship between religion and the brain. This field of scholarship, referred to as neurotheology, can greatly advance our understanding of religion, spirituality, and the brain. Continued studies of both the acute and chronic effects of religion on the brain will be highly valuable. For now, we can be certain that religion affects the brain--we just are not certain how.
Are you a scientist? And have you recently read a peer-reviewed paper that you would like to write about? Please send suggestions to Mind Matters editor Gareth Cook, a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist at the Boston Globe. He can be reached at garethideas AT gmail.com or Twitter @garethideas.
Rights & Permissions
See what we're tweeting about
71 Comments
Add Comment"Protestants, Catholics, and those with no religious affiliation"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDoes this make sense to anyone? What are they saying? If you are religious or not religious you have the problem. Why not say if they have a nose or if they don't have a nose.
"Does this make sense to anyone? What are they saying?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe thing that matters is being "born again," not the specific organization you're affiliated with. You can be born again without belonging to a specific church.
The part I have trouble with is the headline: "Religious experience shrinks brain." This is an unsupported attribution of causality. The article suggests that stress is the actual cause. Becoming born again could easily be part of the reaction to the stress that causes the atrophy, though social changes like being born again can cause further stress, exacerbating the problem.
I think the conclusion (right or wrong) is that being out of the mainstream religious viewpoint (or at conflict with your religion) shrinks part of your brain due to stress.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo if you want a nice healthy brain- be a sheep and believe everything that those around you believe! ;)
Recovered addicts and criminals apparently are attracted to 12-step "spiritual awakenings" and born-again Christianity.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMore generally, the healthier, better-fed, more-intelligent, upper and middle class persons with health insurance coverage may be less likely to experience a "life crises," which are often the trigger to religious awakenings.
Such awakenings appear to be correlated with, what the 12 step groups call "hitting bottom," which would likely be an event more common to addicted and less-healthy people.
The results of this study are meaningless unless they controlled for these populations, and, even then, one would question the credibility of the control factor.
If all such factors were controlled for, you would end up with a CORRELATION, not cause-and-effect.
The fact that this study would be published with this headline is a further example of how bad our science is, particularly in behavioral, medical, and sociology related areas. And the "hard" sciences are just as bad. For example, the "big bang" theory is premised upon a fundamental assumption regarding the distribution of matter in the universe which is a pure "guess," lacking the slightest bit of evidence one way or the other. Yet the theory has taken on the mantle of established fact. "Scientists" are going for the headline, for making a splash, and, ultimately for the money.
Perhaps we need our hippocampus for a functioning "evidence based belief system". Our choices depend on our beliefs and our choices always have consequences. True believers make choices, and experience consequences, from beliefs where there is no evidence whatsoever..
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe social sciences are largely pseudoscience. Any study with N < 10,000 is worthless.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@David N'gog
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisare you still gonna be with us at LFC next season? lol
@Steve D
i agree, but up to a certain point. it would be largely impossible to do any research in these areas when you look at the realities of funding and logistics
Interesting information, and it might be true as suggested because religion in a way or another can lead to stress, but the article also showed that stress is not correlated with hippocampal atrophy, therefore there can't be a vivid proof of the suggested hypothesis. Still, it's also problematic and contradicting to have religion lead to stress and fight it at the same time.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNot surprising, religion, or at least most of them, represses our instincts, and instinctive life, as well as an important part of memory, relies on the hippocampus neuronal circuits
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy not title the article "Atrophied Brain might Cause Religious Experiences"? Also, there's some subtle syllogistic logic in this article that might lead some to conclude that religious experiences are negative, when that is not necessarily the case.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor instance, if one is angry because they are high on some kind of drug, that isn't the same as being angry due to the violation of some principle or wrongdoing. One who is high on a narcotic and falls instantly in "love" cannot be compared to the love shared between a couple who have lived together for 50 years.
This could also apply to any unexplainable experience such as seeing a "UFO" in the sky or a "ghost" in a "haunted house."
"Even very positive, life-changing experiences might be difficult to incorporate into the individual’s prevailing religious belief system and this can also lead to stress and anxiety."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this- Firstly, this post is widely wrong titled... "religion", or spiritual experience itself (which cannot be translated by the term "be religious"...), is not the cause of the problem (and I'm sure that I needn't be a scientist to affirm so).
As the text's semantics are widely based and constructed, the main causes are STRESS and ANXIETY... and I can add a term from psychology studies on repressions, called "GUILT COMPLEX", which is the main mental and spiritual problem of most trully "religious" people in all around the world.
In fact, Religion is a system of behaviour patterns to function as social control... but, "believing in God" is a widely different subject to Religion. There's no need to be "religious" for believe in God and live by the Faith.
So, this article must be thoroughly well written, not in respect of the belief fenomena, but rather by knowing the propper linguistic system which we are dealing with.
I would be interested in more specific data. Does this mean that a boy who was born again at ten years of age and never came back to church after high school is now a 50 year old man with a shrunken brain?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf I start going OM for half an hour a day tomorrow, how long will it take my brain to shrink?
The article left too much unsaid.
I knew religion still had more to offer the planet. - A new weight loss diet.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree the article avoided really stating anything helpful or at least giving some sort of conclusion other than they seemed to see a correlation between a specific region of the brain atrophying and people who were religious and/or had a serious life altering event such as hitting "rock bottom" with drugs or other traumatic event, a religious experience as being "born again", seeing Jesus in toast or maybe even seeing a UFO.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSpeculating, and my opinion, based on what I took from it is that the reduction in that region of the brain might be related to the religious dependency on their faith/god. I wonder if as a person is more deeply dependent on their faith that this region starts shutting down more because there is no need for its full function, you stop analyzing your past to navigate a better future and accept the religion as the only guidance needed and therefore you “think” less in the functions this region supports. Would one’s reliance, dependency on their faith increase the impact on this region of the brain, for example, someone deeply Christian who started the day with prayer, prayed before eating each meal and so on have more or less impact on their brain than someone of the same faith which practices their faith less and maybe attends church once a week but doesn’t pray before meals but is still involved just to a much lesser degree.
I would like to see if one religious group suffers this more than another, for example how do Christians compare to Buddhist, are there similarities between faiths that have commonalities for instance Judaism and Christianity do we see a similar effect and in Hinduism and Buddhist do we see a different but similar effect? And again how would someone who is atheist balance it? I don’t think you could find a control, define a “normal” belief with all the variants to choose but you can compare function and benefit/detriment on the physical body and mind. I think this also present a fundamental problem with this research, do you want religions "rated", it gets hariy?
Now the positives that are suggested through the article are trying to convey/relate to another thread/study to take into consideration. For example, religions that practice meditation in which you try to clear the mind as well as prayer in others show positive impacts to the brain and a reduction of stress. So would you see an increase in the ability to cope with stress and what state of impact on the brain of one religious faith or group over another?
_______________
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Protestants, Catholics, and those with no religious affiliation"
Does this make sense to anyone?
_______________
The above would not include Buddhists, Taoists, Jains, Sikhs, Hindus, Satanists ... etc.
The cause and effect are not clear from this article.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPerhaps it is the brain atrophy that causes religious experiences, and that causes stress. I'm not suggesting this is necessarily the case, just illustrating other potential cause and effect relationships.
My father is a fundamentalist but he says he has no religious affiliation. It does not mean you are not religious, Just that you do not label yourself under any group.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSome affiliations are more strict more religious/spiritual minded then other just as one church can be more religious then the next down the street and it affects all it members.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDoctrine and a persons personal belief in the church's or organizations dogma has a lot to do with this.
The majority of born again I have known are because of stress- fear and guilt.
You are correct that if a religious person does not want to see how confused they are, they must become like a child (gullible) and not reflect on doubt or question to far.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis person would be at some peace as long as they didn't think too hard. Ignorance is bliss.
@Religious Experiences Shrink Part of the Brain:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo true, Religious following is straight line rules and walk down a blind alley; it is designed to kill reason, logic rationalism and creativity. Hence brain usage is zero ,no pros and cons required, may be only pros.
Once brain is stifled of any reasoning the exercise required to keep the brain healthy is nipped in the bud. Lack of exercise clogs the brain.
When cardiovascular clogging occurs one dies of massive heart attack, on the contrary when our brain clogs the death occurs 'within;' the thinking dies the thinker within us drops dead. Ironically the individual still walks but inadvertently acts like a zombie or a living dead, enlarge this predicament to a society and you have billions of living dead walking purposelessly. That is the tragedy of commons.
@Religious Experiences Shrink Part of the Brain:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo true, Religious following is straight line rules and walk down a blind alley; it is designed to kill reason, logic rationalism and creativity. Hence brain usage is zero ,no pros and cons required, may be only pros.
Once brain is stifled of any reasoning the exercise required to keep the brain healthy is nipped in the bud. Lack of exercise clogs the brain.
When cardiovascular clogging occurs one dies of massive heart attack, on the contrary when our brain clogs the death occurs 'within;' the thinking dies the thinker within us drops dead. Ironically the individual still walks but inadvertently acts like a zombie or a living dead, enlarge this predicament to a society and you have billions of living dead walking purposelessly. That is the tragedy of commons.
Christendom is so full of inaccuracies and teachings that go against common sense and reasoning that to believe in them, you would have to turn off part of your brain! So, now there is some proof that they actually do. This is amazing...and i'm someone who believes in the Bible.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlease, there are many other ways that might explain this link. Perhaps the born-agains, Catholics and non-affiliated had been through more economic success than the mainstream Protestants. Maybe that's the real significant correlation. Or maybe the born-agains, Catholics and non-affiliated are angry at society for rejecting the "truth" of their views, that is, the correlation is not to religious/spiritual experience but to politicized religion.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's the return of the Great Hippopotamus Test:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Hippocampus_Question
In my college days we used to poke fun at correlation studies by saying that there would be a high correlation between some life event and recently having eaten mashed potatoes. More seriously though, I used to suffer a lot of stress while trying to maintain the faith, i. e. being born again, a church-goer and so on. After I got past my religious phase, the stress moderated quite a lot. Perhaps there were other changes in my life that caused this stress reduction? Which came first--the religion or the stress? I think that the interpretation of experimental results--sometimes--can be severely limited by the mindset of the experimenter. This seems like one of those times.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe language in this article is not clear and confusing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor instance: "showed greater atrophy in the hippocampus in individuals who identify with specific religious groups as well as those with no religious affiliation."
What does he mean with "as well as those"?
It he mentions "greater atrophy in...", then greater than what?
Then do we have to understand "than in" instead of "as well as"?
As for content: it would help to define what quantity of "atrophy" has been measure compared to the volume of the hippocampus of the reference individuals.
The whole article lacks rigor and sews more confusion than clarity.
From the first paragraph: "The study ---- showed greater atrophy in the hippocampus in individuals who identify with specific religious groups as well as those with no religious affiliation"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy not call the article "Common, "everyday" Christians are protected against brain atrophy"?
Well, its well documented that religious folk are less intelligent than irreligious folk, so it is hardly surprising.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMr. Newburg: "Thus, Owen and HIS colleagues . . . ." Shouldn't that have been "Thus, Owen and HER colleagues . . . "? Or are you too "born again" to proofread? Peace.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe article mentioned studies on prayer and meditation but focused on one study, MRI scans and a survey of people 58 and over, cross references with a survey.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPrayer and meditation is like listening to music; does a love of music cause a deterioration? I cant see how a religious practice of prayer can be ignored as it is meant to sooth, not stress.
Perhaps moral deliberation causes stress, but that is a rational activity, applying creeds and values to a program of action, but is the underlying picture one of reconciling a rational ideal with the contingency of life.
As is too often the case, is this not yet another myopic interpretation - particularly when it comes to the tedious clash between evolutionary and faith based world views? Everything published to this point about depression indicates that the 'natural' state of consciousness is slightly delusionally overoptimistic in its perceptions. Could it not possibly be the case that this 're-alignment' may reflect a struggle that is actually a psychologically healthy one - that of not mildly delusionally one of revelling in onesself as the god of one's own universe - as Richard Dawkins seems to tout as the domain of the 'scientifically rational' mind?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is a correlational study. Why does the title imply that it investigates a causal relationship?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAlright: anyone who claims that having religious beliefs benefits the brain has got a lot of verification and explaining to do. That's because involvement with creating a false reality which conflicts with Reality creates various negative conditions for the healthy brain. The observed
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"benefit" of reducing stress is short-term in all cases. That's because prayer and meditation are merely temporary distractions from the business at hand: which is dealing with Reality and negative experiences and conditions in one's life.
WHAT scientist doesn't know that success in dealing with problems (including disastrous ones) in life is MOST beneficial to the brain both in short and long term contexts??!!
Sure, we all need a break from tension and meditation can lead to easier sleep which is restorative. But that's the only connection which is beneficial and - believing in religious mumbo jumbo needn't be part of the meditative process.
I sincerely hope that Jesus and Mohammed and Buddha (etceteras) were all the Real Deal and that there is One Holy Creator. But every time someone from the "priest caste" has been examined, they've been proven to be charlatans. It's absolutely OK to believe in a Higher Power but to believe the mishmash scam jobs written and spoken by Frauds, now that's not OK. Remember that all of these Holy Charlatans are against any form of questioning, truth-seeking and scientific investigation. No further "clues" needed.
I'm certain how religion affects the brain and body. The same way ANY thoughts and emotions affect anyone. If that wasn't the case, it wouldn't be irrelavent weather or not one is religious in their own way. It's easy to be imaginative and persuasive, but to create clear corala-tions takes humility and not needing to prove ANYTHING. As Emerson said, "Be open to everything and attached to nothing". Certainly when your trying to solve a problem, at least. Don't you think. Tonight I walked in the fresh air. I think I get a fresh perspective and re-growth in my hippocampus doing this.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHas the author done what good science demands and looked at the opposing position, that people generally BECOME dedicated to religious or meditative practices because they are are experiencing major depression for some reason not relieved by "logic and reason"
Small hippocampal size has indeed been linked to depression in humans. For instance, one study's authors found that
****"Subjects with a history of recurring depression had significantly smaller left and right hippocampal volumes with no differences in total cerebral volumes. The degree of hippocampal volume reduction correlated with total duration of major depression. In addition, large (diameter 2 4.5 mm)-hippocampal low signal foci (LSF) were found within the hippocampus, and their number also correlated with the total number of days depressed. These results suggest that depression is associated with hippocampal atrophy, perhaps due to a progressive process mediated by glucocorticoid neurotoxicity."
****quoted from: YVETTE I. SHELINE*tS, PO W. WANG*§, MOKHTAR H. GADOtS, JOHN G. CSERNANSKY*, AND MICHAEL W. VANNIERtt
Departments of *Psychiatry and tRadiology, and tMallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63110
Communicated by Erminio Costa, University of Illinois, Chicago, IL, December 27, 1995 (received for review October 10, 1995).
perhaps the author's conclusions were biased and based on a personal dislike of religious or meditative practices?
He should make sure that he hasn't put the "cart before the horse".
There may be an evolutionary problem in the hypothesis insofar as religion in some form has been an integral part of human development and therefore a necessary agent of our success as a species. IN those terms, the positives of religion must outweigh the negatives else humans would have gone extinct or been marginalized by a superior life form. We not only were successful, we are the dominant lifeform on the planet. And are the only one that are "reverent" to a transcendent.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's important to read the actual study to understand what is being said here. The study only states a correlation between atrophy of the hippocampus and a 'life changing religious experience" (LCRE) or a state of being "born-again" (BA). Further, the study is a fairly long one (from 1994 to date), and distinguishes between those having the LCRE or BA experience during the study, hence a change in status, and those with the LCRE or BA status at the beginning of the study.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisClarifying the "non-religious" issue, the study categorizes individuals with "no religious affiliation", self-reported, as different than those who report "none" for religious interest - hence the report of "no religious affiliation" does not mean "atheist" or "agnostic", it means not a member of a specific religious practice, as self-reported.
The article is unclear about these points, though to be fair, has to make them in much shorter form than the study.
The study proposes that the MRI data correlated with the self-reported religious experience indicates that there is a correlation between reduced hippocampus volume and intense religious experience, but I don't sense that the study claims a causality either way - and of course it could be both ways or neither (a third, unnoticed cause of both...). The study does reference a previous study that indicates individuals with reduced hippocampus activity (due to epilepsy) have exhibited hyper-religiosity.
This could also be a case where the emotionally-naive scientists are calling the healthy people, sick.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA more practical theory might be that if modern levels of emotionality are actually unnatural to the human being, then the hippocampus might be expected “swell” in it’s attempt to cope.
We would then predict that people who are: born again; deeply religious; effective meditators; near-death experienced; or in a deeply self-correcting depressed state, would require less emotionality in their daily lives, and that their hippocampi would naturally shrink to normal proportions.
It is well known that alcoholism/addiction is a problem at any income level or educational level; Just ask the AMA for a list of Doctors who suffer from these ills.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFurthermore, your statement seems to imply that "well educated" people are somehow immune to tragedy, and that bad fortune results not from chance but stupidity. I know people from all income and educational levels, not having led the sheltered life you seem to have experienced.
Sometimes "educational arrogance" prevents one from understanding the obvious: intelligence and wisdom are found at all social levels.
Association is not causation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis only confirms what all of us educated readers of "Scientific American" already know. Christians are dumb. The Bible is fiction. Anyone who takes seriously the Judaeo-Christian Myth of Creation as described in the Book of Genesis is woefully ignorant.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWith the possible exception of SIR ISAAC NEWTON, check out his religious writings here:
http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/prism.php?id=44
oh, and maybe MAX PLANCK and um... Lord Kelvin and...Louis Pasteur ,Gregor Mendel , James Clerk Maxwell , Michael Faraday , Joseph Priestley , Leonhard Euler , Gottfried Leibniz , Robert Boyle , Blaise Pascal , René Descartes , Johannes Kepler , John Napier , Nicolaus Copernicus ..... And many other scientists who held the Christian world view.
I guess THEY all had "hippocampal atrophy",too. Sure.
Would you like a receipt for that bridge?
One word: Poppycock
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMaybe it's the other way around. A small brain is required to accept the idea of a magic man looking after you?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRegarding the headline--is it bad science or merely a jouralistic attention getting device?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRegarding the small sample size--the article clearly recognizes that limitation of the study and calls for more research. That doesn't make the study bad science; it's mearly an early step in a possible line of research.
Regarding the stress ideas--may I suggest an alternative hypothesis? Might there be a connection to how people approach religion, with brain atrophy caused by a reduction in critical thinking? The observations might thus point towards correlation (not cause) between the different groups and the amount of critical thinking allowed or required.
This is what happens to your brain when you surrender your thinking and decision-making to someone else.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe "conversion experience" is a powerful sense of relief one gets when turning over one's life to Jesus (really to some pulpit demagogue masquerading as God's emisssary on earth). When one no longer has to think for one's self, the brain atrophies.
I believe this, because I've been there...twice.
Newton held that worshiping Christ as God was heresy. He was an "antitrinitarian."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNewton's body contained very high amounts of mercury leading scientists to believe that his bizzare behavior in his later life was caused by mercurcy poisoning.
This is a wishy washy wash article. I am sea sick. It has no real content that I can relate to. Maybe the cart before the horse is in play. My hoppocampus has some tidal waves sloshing around in there.The reality is that the brain is so amazing in it's potential and it's limitations that it is open to all kinds of theories and speculations.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am willing to accept and be interested in all, however this article is so poorly written.
There may be a cause-effect relation between religious affiliation and hippocampal atrophy, but if so, stress likely has little to do with it. I would argue that a more likely explanation is that rigid beliefs that are assumed to be infallible constrict various brain functions. (therefore atheists and extremely religious individuals who tend to be more dogmatic would be more affected than say agnostics, pantheists, and those who are moderately religious) The result could be that such constriction inhibits growth and development of the hippocampus.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm not religious, but the title strikes me as cynical sensationalism. I suspect an editor was behind it, trying to get more people to read it. Interesting article, though, if pretty inconclusive. I'm very interested in the physiology and psychology of religion, but I'm only beginning to really get into it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs it is obvious that the described study does not attribute with certainty this state of the brain to the existence (or the absence ) of religious faith, how it is that the general idea is that “Religious Experiences Shrink Part of the Brain”? Before expressing such a thesis I think one should remember Plato’s words: “saying something wrong is not a mere error; rather, it is something that could harm the soul.” (Phaedo, 115E). I would like to quote hereupon an excerpt from the book “The Next Step of Creation – The Revelation” of the writer and gnoseologist Ioannis G. Tsatsaris, which I believe perfectly describes the way research is conducted today as well how its results are perceived: “... people have formed an isolated impression of things and they cannot (...) see how elements are moving and how each part is differentiated. Their ignorance makes them leap to various conclusions and those conclusions, because they converge in similarity of relation and conclusiveness of the observed, are expressed as if they were very positive. But they are not. The positive of the parametric is one thing, and the convergence from a parametric state to come to an individual dimension of relations of acceptance as well as of fragmentation is quite another.” (Ioannis G. Tsatsaris, “The Next Step of Creation – The Revelation”, p. 199, Vantage Press, New York, 2007)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisZoe Pittaki, Economist / Athens
newborns enter the world with a large number of neural connections in all parts of the brain, which significantly decrease over time, as the newborns interact with and "learn" from their environment. adults who are learning new things experience an i ncrease in neural connections, followed by a significant decrease in those same connections in the areas of the brain associated with the new "{learned" task. significant, "life altering" events in people with religious behavior may very well act as "learning".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisto Dave Tringle
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisU r so right yr comment made me laugh " insurance coverage" lol
yeah the more u r intelligent, have better jobs, spend more time at work earning someone else the money, the more u r chained to all capitalistic inventions in order to keep yr head above water, the more u stress, the more yr mental health suffers.
religion has nothing to do with it, in fact i can say that religion and god brings u up and helps u deal with stuff, why would it cause u go cookoo? i dont get it, i dont get what the article says, its all a form of social control, this is the use of science to control society.
If scientists decide to study a typically known sign of aging, i.e., the shrinking brain, not just the hippocampus, and relate that to something else then you've got a study, a possible funding source, or grant, to stay the course a few more years at the lab or university.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat the brain starts shrinking as we get older is a known and generally accepted fact; to correlate that with any activity or event, i.e., from going to church, any church, watching baseball games, or playing shuffleboard, is irrelevant. Other signs of aging, i.e., loss of height, weight gain, hair loss, etc., would've been possible to study, and correlate, as well.
I don't appreciate correlations, and that someone was paid to report a known fact. Brain atrophy occurs from normal aging, in addition to a few other known problems, i.e., Alzheimer's disease, the most feared. Religion offers many coping skills in life, not the cause of a shrinking brain, or hippocampus, though.
Doesn't take long to read the original study, and reports on brain activity during meditation and prayer:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn this first article you can see why the MRI might lead some to misinterpret the effect of prayer and meditation on the brain. "And this is your brain on prayer" is an article on the original scientific study by Andrew Newberg, M.D., and Eugene D’Aquili, M.D.:
http://intro2psych.wordpress.com/2008/03/11/and-this-is-your-brain-on-prayers/
and here's the original study by the two doctors:
http://andrewnewberg.com/pdfs/2003/Prayer.pdf
"Specifically, meditators showed significantly larger volumes of the hippocampus and areas within the orbito-frontal cortex, the thalamus and the inferior temporal gyrus — all regions known for regulating emotions."
http://www.physorg.com/news161355537.html
I have read the article as well as 54 comments. I mean no disrespect and i don't want to sound judgmental. But, i would rate the validity of the commentary in this order: A-#54(Kenneth3rd). The development of critical thinking can be a strenuous undertaking and requires all kinds of effort. Exercising the the body is like training the brain--"no pain, no gain". In order for us to all learn, grow, develop, mature; or 'evolve' as a species, it is important to take & keep notes. (note how this comment allows us to do further research if we are so inclined). Trial and error are part of the process; no one is all knowing or infallible or perfect, we all make mistakes. Some learn faster, some work more diligently, some have better coping skills, etc... B-#48(Night dreamer) [beware of labels. Likewise, words can be ambiguous] I sense there is a relationship between being narrow-minded and open-minded. Narrow-minded is easier because we don't need to work at understanding complexity, like an artist who needs a paint-by-number set because they lack natural talent. Open-mindedness throws us into the endless morass of trying to sort out fact from fiction and faith from fantasy. C- #37(JohninVT)[i have a poor memory and limited computer skills. I would like to 'jump to' #37 to refresh my memory and comment, but i'm afraid doing so will erase what i've written so far. This would require me to use some coping mechanism to reduce my frustration/anxiety. Instead, let me finish the list
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisof what i believe to be the top ten comments. D-#21 (lqbal Latif). E-#45(Grumpyoldman).F-#50(zoepittaki).
G-#52(patrishka). (H)-#'s33,37,31 &35. (I)-#'s53,52,41,
&39. (honorable mention)-to- #'s 31,25,14,11&4. As this is already rather lengthy, let me finish by adding; The further down the list, the more difficult to arrange in any particular order. Everyone who responded deserves an 'E' for Effort. I didn't read any commentary that was inappropriate or ridiculous.
I certainly hope no one is offended, let's keep trying.
Im not religious and in a way this makes sense to me. I see religion as a closed minded system. People base everything they believe on one book, to me thats about as closed minded as you can get. I also like to use the idea " If you don't use it you lose it" pretty true about a lot of things if you really think about it. Anyway it would make prefect sense that if a person closed their mind off to new ideas that this part of the brain would "die" atrophy. I would like to continue to see studies like this one because I think they will finally open up peoples minds and maybe see the poison for what it is!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIA reminder of K Marx: "Religion is the opiate of the masses". This article prompts such questions as: Do we use our brains less actively (reasoning) because we are receptive to others doing our thinking for us? or Do we seek the opportunity to join groups which permit us to accept prescribed rather than discovered understandings? In addition to active (intentional) and passive (contextual) aspects of such belief systems, researchers need to consider the role of religous affiliations and beliefs as 'cultural phenomena', as well as the possible effects of individual intellectual and emotional reflections associated with cognitive patterns and structures.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIA reminder of K Marx: "Religion is the opiate of the masses". This article prompts such questions as: Do we use our brains less actively (reasoning) because we are receptive to others doing our thinking for us? or Do we seek the opportunity to join groups which permit us to accept prescribed rather than discovered understandings? In addition to active (intentional) and passive (contextual) aspects of such belief systems, researchers need to consider the role of religous affiliations and beliefs as 'cultural phenomena', as well as the possible effects of individual intellectual and emotional reflections associated with cognitive patterns and structures.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA concern is the group used for this particular study. The article states that the subjects were selected from a Depression in the Elderly group. That appears to set up an inherent immediate conflict for the study.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm with #10. It seems more likely that someone with an atrophied hippocampus or right brain injury would be more likely to have religious experiences.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's really rather sad. Scientific American, in the very recent past, was, while not a peer reviewed refereed journal, was a place for scientists to see a general compilation of the broad interdisciplinary work in the science community written by colleagues within their fields of study without the rigor of the journals.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNow, the standards are totally stripped and the screed on this website is so abbreviated that quality research has to survive some rather trivial barbs. The quality of the comments is the same as all other blogs with the idle opinion slinging you get on any blog. It is just sad. I would have hoped for better.
@Fine Material.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisStrange as it sounds, there is a group of people who identify themselves as "Christian" but "not religious". They are "dis-organzed" Christians who say that they do not like "organized" religion but subscribe to a heavily fundamentalist evangelical belief set, which stresses "a personal relationship with Jesus" as their main cohesive belief. They may, or may not, join in group worship and prayer with other like-minded theists but dislike admitting that this is an organized "church" or "religious group".
The conclusions of this study (at least as reported by the headlines) are questionable. The tested group were
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"originally recruited for the NeuroCognitive Outcomes of Depression in the Elderly study", suggesting that all had problems with memory. The hippocampus is heavily involved in processing and tagging information that is in the short term memory circuitry and moving it or retrieving it from the long terms memory banks. The findings may be an artifact of concentrating in a sample with these specific problems.
If the finding turns out to be robust in a larger, less heavily selected sample then the researchers need to answer the question of how memory, and the emotion related to memory storage and tagging processes, is correlated with religious belief.
i read it once and it made perfect sense. they said the growth could be due to stress or spiritual pain, which is hard to differ from physical pain in the human brain. theres a huge difference from a life before and after being born again for the rest of their lives. speaking from experience i found this extremely enlightening.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe heading is not justified by the contents of the study. The directionality is moot; so is the hypothesis concerning the role of stress in these cases.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is perfectly possible that people with life experiences that have or will result in shrinkage of the hippocampus, leading a consequently poor memory and ability to deal with anger, may be mentally, socially and emotionally prone to conversion experiences. In that case, conversion experiences are simply a symptom of a wider problem.
As someone else has pointed out, those who are economically, socially and educationally advantaged do not seem to be as prone to conversion experiences. Further, the greater the education and achievement in the sciences, the greater is the chance that a person will not believe in a god. Likewise, the less social a person and the more they suffer from autism spectrum disorders, the more likely they are to be unaffected by proselyzing and the more disinterested they are in religion.
Are we looking at social variables? emotional variables? memory capacity? conditions which impair brain functioning? or something else?
The study is equally, perhaps more, consistent with the hypothesis that brain impaired people are more vulnerable to religious conversion and heavily emotional variants of religion.
The root of the discussion is not so much religion as it is the reasons for the shrinkage of the hippocampus, which is an essential component of the human brain that sustains the short-term and long-term memory. The reasons for the shrinkage of the hippocampus, as is pointed out in this article, is related to high volumes of extreme stress among individuals "who struggle with their beliefs, [because they] experience higher levels of stress".However, I don't see how this is a direct link to observing religion and why religion is singled out as the one keynote factor. Stress can be caused by numerous things, such as break ups, loss of loved ones, or even loosing a job. I would say that more Americans right now are stressed over unemployment than they are over religion. Ironically enough, most people turn to religion and reconnect with their faith during times of hardship, and in fact very few individuals take their religion to the extreme.This article should not be titled “Religious Experiences Shrink Part of the Part”, but “High Volumes of Stress May Cause Severe, Long-Term Effects on the Human Brain” (or something along those lines). Why would a reputable journal like the Scientific American want to skew the issue here? I wish they wouldn’t do that, they are loosing their subscribers because of this. Note to the Scientific American, please know that I do respect your publication a lot, but it saddens me to see these articles and it deters my interest from reading future publications. I hope you will considers this.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisKindly,
The root of the discussion is not so much religion as it is the reasons for the shrinkage of the hippocampus, which is an essential component of the human brain that sustains the short-term and long-term memory. The reasons for the shrinkage of the hippocampus, as is pointed out in this article, is related to high volumes of extreme stress among individuals "who struggle with their beliefs, [because they] experience higher levels of stress".However, I don't see how this is a direct link to observing religion and why religion is singled out as the one keynote factor. Stress can be caused by numerous things, such as break ups, loss of loved ones, or even loosing a job. I would say that more Americans right now are stressed over unemployment than they are over religion. Ironically enough, most people turn to religion and reconnect with their faith during times of hardship, and in fact very few individuals take their religion to the extreme.This article should not be titled “Religious Experiences Shrink Part of the Part”, but “High Volumes of Stress May Cause Severe, Long-Term Effects on the Human Brain” (or something along those lines). Why would a reputable journal like the Scientific American want to skew the issue here? I wish they wouldn’t do that, they are loosing their subscribers because of this. Note to the Scientific American, please know that I do respect your publication a lot, but it saddens me to see these articles and it deters my interest from reading future publications. I hope you will considers this.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisKindly,
This is a muddled mess of reporting and study setup. If not it would have been interesting. First of all the recruitment was from another study that has a high sample of severely depressed people in an already small sample size to begin with. So at best we would be talking about a high degree of people who despite their religious experiences were already experiencing depression (associated with atrophy). For all we know the clinically depressed people might have sought out religion as a treatment for their existing depression Second it doesn't categorize religious beliefs but rather labels of Protestant, Catholic and Born again without much reference to religious practice/adherence (the one reference to practice shows no effect negative or positive). Third 92.3% of participants identify a religion and around 80% identify the same religion - Christianity. So for the most part the comparison is being made between the religious and the religious.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIts been awhile since I have seen a study filled with so many holes
The article refers to relationship between religion and brain atrophy. By no religion affiliation the autor might refer to the ones being religious but not linked to a specific group ! it could be a personal religion pratice or belief . Does this makes sense ?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow many angels can dance on a pin head?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour title is utterly misleading. Rather than express -- with caution -- the scientific disclaimers that you state clearly toward the end of the article, you choose to sensationalize. Very bad practice for a -- scientific -- magazine.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this