Abstracts – 2010s
Jeff Levin. (In press). “Revisiting the Alexander UFO Religious Crisis Survey (AUFORCS): Is There Really a Crisis?” Journal of Scientific Exploration.
This paper explores the tacit presumption that U.S. government disclosure of information regarding prior contact with extraterrestrials would precipitate a religious crisis (presuming that there is information to disclose). This issue has remained controversial since the earliest ufological writing, both government and academic, yet only minimal empirical evidence has been forthcoming. The present analysis is based on data collected as a part of the Alexander UFO Religious Crisis Survey (AUFORCS), a private study of Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Jewish clergy (N = 229) conducted in 1994 whose raw data only recently have been made public (to the author of this paper). The AUFORCS consisted of 11 statements about extraterrestrial contact, alien life, and a putative impact on religion, scaled on a five-point Likert metric requiring respondents to affirm their agreement or disagreement with each item. Findings from the AUFORCS data confirm that disclosure would not precipitate much of a religious crisis. Nor do there appear to be substantive differences in how leaders of respective religious traditions would react to such disclosure. The desirability of replicating this study through a large-scale national probability survey of the U.S. adult population is discussed.
Jeff Levin and Jay F. Hein. (2012). “A Faith-Based Prescription for the Surgeon General: Challenges and Recommendations.” Journal of Religion and Health (online prepublication).
This article summarizes how the Office of the Surgeon General can leverage faith-based resources to fulfill its mission and that of the Surgeon General of the United States. Such resources, personal and institutional, have been utilized historically in health promotion and disease prevention efforts and are a valuable ally for public health, an alliance that continues under the Obama administration. This paper outlines the history and mission of the Office; details the recent history of federal faith-based initiatives; and advocates an expanded alliance between the faith-based and public health sectors sensitive to legal and professional boundaries.
Background: This study investigates religious predictors of psychological well-being and psychological distress in a five-year national probability sample of Israeli Jews (N = 4,073). Data were taken from the 2006-2010 annual surveys of Israel as a part of the multinational Gallup World Poll.
Methods: Analyses identified religious predictors of five-item scales of well-being and distress, adjusting for effects of several covariates, including health satisfaction. Additional analyses examined differences in religion, well-being and distress, and their interrelationships by categories of Jewish religious identity and observance (hiloni, masorti, dati, and haredi).
Results: Levels of religiousness and of well-being increase as one moves “rightward” across Jewish observance. Self-ratings of importance of religion and religious attendance are significantly associated with well-being, overall, and a religious harmony scale is associated with both well-being (positively) and distress (inversely), and with these measures’ respective items, overall and across Jewish observance.
Conclusions: Religious indicators are significant predictors of both psychological well-being and psychological distress in Israeli Jews, regardless of Jewish religious observance.
Jeff Levin. (2011). “Religion and Positive Well-Being among Israeli and Diaspora Jews: Findings from the World Values Survey.” Mental Health, Religion & Culture. (Online prepublication.)
This study investigates the impact of selected religious indicators on two measures of positive well-being among Jews. Using data from subsamples of Jewish respondents from Israel (N = 1,023) and the diaspora (N = 859) taken from the World Values Survey, single-item measures of happiness and life satisfaction were regressed onto six measures of religiousness in the diaspora sample and onto the one religious measure available in the Israeli sample, adjusting for effects of age, gender, marital status, education, employment, and social class. Among Israeli Jews, affirming the importance of God in one’s life is modestly associated with greater life satisfaction (beta = 0.07, p < 0.05), but not with happiness. In the diaspora, the same measure is associated with greater happiness (beta = 0.13, p < 0.01), as is more frequent attendance at synagogue services (beta = 0.14, p < 0.01), but neither is associated with life satisfaction.
Jeff Levin and Michele F. Prince. (2011). “Judaism and Health: Reflections on an Emerging Scientific Field.” Journal of Religion and Health 4:765-777.
This paper surveys the field of Judaism and health. The authors trace the history of discourse on health and healing within Judaism, from the biblical and rabbinic eras to contemporary research and writing on Jewish bioethics, pastoral care, communal services, and aging, including congregational and community programming related to health and illness and emergence of the Jewish healing movement. The work of the Kalsman Institute on Judaism and Health is described, focusing on efforts to unite these various threads into a scholarly field emphasizing basic and applied research on the instrumental functions of Jewish religious life for health and well-being.
Jeff Levin. (2011). “Health Impact of Jewish Religious Observance in the USA: Findings from the 2000-01 National Jewish Population Survey.” Journal of Religion and Health 4:852-868.
Using data from the 2000-01 National Jewish Population Survey (NJPS) (N = 5,148), effects of eight religious measures were investigated in relation to two health outcomes, standard single-item indicators of self-rated health and presence of an activity-limiting health condition. Seven of the religious measures were associated bivariately with one or both health indicators. Through two-step OLS regression of each health indicator onto all of the religious measures, adjusting for age and other sociodemographic correlates, two measures of synagogue involvement remained statistically significant. Follow-up analysis revealed a net health impact of religious observance primarily limited to Orthodox and Conservative Jews.
Jeff Levin, Robert Joseph Taylor, and Linda M. Chatters. (2011). “Prevalence and Sociodemographic Correlates of Spiritual Healer Use: Findings from the National Survey of American Life.” Complementary Therapies in Medicine 19:63-70.
Objectives: This study investigates sociodemographic and health-related correlates of use of a spiritual healer for medical help. A large national, multiracial-multiethnic data source permits a more comprehensive investigation than was possible in previous studies. It also enables a closer focus on socioeconomic disadvantage and health need as determinants of utilization.
Design and setting: Respondents are from the National Survey of American Life: Coping with Stress in the 21st Century (NSAL), a nationally representative multi-stage area-probability survey of U.S. adult African Americans, Caribbean Blacks, and non-Hispanic Whites conducted from 2001-2003. The sample contains 6,082 adults aged 18 and over.
Main outcome measures: NSAL respondents were surveyed about lifetime use of alternative providers for medical care or advice. Response categories included two types of spiritual healers: faith healers and psychics. These outcomes were logistically regressed, separately, onto 10 sociodemographic or health-related indicators: race/ethnicity, age, gender, marital status, education, household income, region, medical care use, insurance coverage, and self-rated health.
Results: Lifetime utilization of a faith healer is more prevalent among respondents in good health and less prevalent among Caribbean Blacks and never married persons. Users of a psychic healer are more likely to be educated, residents of the Northeast or West, and previously married, and less likely to report excellent health.
Conclusions: Use of a spiritual healer is not due, on average, to poor education, marginal racial/ethnic or socioeconomic status, dire health straits, or lack of other healthcare options. To some extent, the opposite appears to be true. Use of a spiritual healer is not associated with fewer social and personal resources or limitations in health or healthcare.
Jeff Levin. (2011). “Energy Healers: Who They Are and What They Do.” EXPLORE: The Journal of Science and Healing 7:13-26.
This paper surveys the landscape of energy healing, offering a taxonomy and conceptual overview of the work of practitioners. First, systems of energy healing are classified under four categories: an East Asian tradition, a Western professional tradition, a bioenergy tradition, and a contemporary metaphysical tradition. Examples of each are provided. Second, the possibility of core concepts in energy healing is broached, focusing specifically on five issues: the source of healing and its pathway of transmission, what it is that is being transmitted, what it is that healers do, the healer’s state of consciousness, and requirements of clients in order to receive healing. Third, a discussion is provided of the relative importance of technique in energy healing. Fourth, what really matters for healing is proposed, emphasizing three factors: focus, intention, and compassion. Finally, the paper concludes by suggesting that formally trained energy practitioners do not have a monopoly on energy healing.
Jeff Levin, Linda M. Chatters, and Robert Joseph Taylor. (2011). “Theory in Religion, Aging, and Health.” Journal of Religion and Health 50:389-406.
This paper provides an overview of theory in religion, aging, and health. It offers both a primer on theory and a roadmap for researchers. Four “tenses” of theory are described-distinct ways that theory comes into play in this field: grand theory, mid-range theory, use of theoretical models, and positing of constructs which mediate or moderate putative religious effects. Examples are given of both explicit and implicit uses of theory. Sources of theory for this field are then identified, emphasizing perspectives of sociologists and psychologists, and discussion is given to limitations of theory. Finally, reflections are offered as to why theory matters.
Jeff Levin and Berton H. Kaplan. (2010). “The Sorokin Multidimensional Inventory of Love Experience (SMILE): Development, Validation, and Religious Determinants.” Review of Religious Research 51:380-401.
This paper describes the development and validation of the Sorokin Multidimensional Inventory of Love Experience (SMILE), a 24-item scale based on the writing of sociologist Pitirim Sorokin. The SMILE contains six subscales of four items each, corresponding to what Sorokin termed the religious, ethical, ontological, biological, psychological, and social domains of love. Through confirmatory factor analysis, all factor loadings were found to be strong and statistically significant. A model specifying intercorrelations among all subscales exhibited good overall fit, although biological love was only weakly related to the other factors. Finally, through hierarchical OLS regression, religious measures were found to be significant determinants of scores on five of six subscales. This confirms Sorokin’s hypothesis that affirming the experience of love is in part a function of religiousness. The SMILE promises to broaden the scope of social research on love and to promote investigation of this neglected psychosocial construct.
Jeff Levin. (2010). “Religion and Mental Health: Theory and Research.” International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies 7:102-115.
This article provides an overview of psychiatric and mental health research on religion. First, conceptual models of religion and of mental health used throughout this literature are described. Second, published empirical research in this field is summarized, including findings from epidemiologic, clinical, and social and behavioral investigations. Third, promising theoretical perspectives for understanding a putative religion–mental health connection are elaborated. These are based on respective behavioral, biological, psychodynamic, and transpersonal interpretations of existing research findings.