Mental health professionals have long debated about the
relationship between strong religious beliefs and mental health. An article
published in Medical News Today March 5, 2009, “Believing In God Can Help Block
Anxiety And Minimize Stress, According To New University Of Toronto Research,”
examines this issue. The article reports on two studies conducted by
researchers at the New University Of Toronto Research. The researchers
studied, “…participants [who] performed
a Stroop task - a well-known test of cognitive control - while hooked up to
electrodes that measured their brain activity.” The results of the study were
interesting. “…Compared to non-believers, the religious participants showed
significantly less activity in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), a portion
of the brain that helps modify behavior by signaling when attention and control
are needed, usually as a result of some anxiety-producing event like making a
mistake. The stronger their religious zeal and the more they believed in God,
the less their ACC fired in response to their own errors, and the fewer errors
they made.” The researchers conclude, “…You could think of this part of the
brain like a cortical alarm bell that rings when an individual has just made a
mistake or experiences uncertainty….We found that religious people or even
people who simply believe in the existence of God show significantly less brain
activity in relation to their own errors. They're much less anxious and feel
less stressed when they have made an error."
The Bottom Line: The results of these studies strongly suggest that believing in God can reduce your anxiety about making errors.
Reference: Original article
Great Informational Websites Created by Dr. Speller and Dr. Korkosz:
- Stress and the Human Brain
- Early Life Stress and the Immune System
- The Facts About Major Depressive Disorder
- The Parent's Guide to Understanding Adolescent Depression
Sources: See blogposts in Psychiatric Disorders: General
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Dr. Jeffrey Speller Dr. Tanya Korkosz
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