Religion Is Good for Kids

"Kids with religious parents are better behaved and adjusted than other children, according to a new study that is the first to look at the effects of religion on young child development." This is the conclusion reported in Fox News on April 24, 2007.

The study was conducted by a Mississippi State University sociologist and his colleagues who asked the parents and teachers of more than sixteen thousand first graders to rate how much self-control they believed the kids had, how often they exhibited poor or unhappy behavior, and how well they respected and worked with their peers. These scores were compared to how often the parents said they attend worship services and talk with their children about religion at home. And of course the kids with the higher scores were the ones whose parents (more so if both did) attended worship services regularly and talked about religion with their children.

The study didn't look at which kids were the best behaved: Protestant? Jewish? Catholic? And one naysayer thought that perhaps only parents with the best behaved children attend worship services--so by implication, those with ill-behaved children must stay home. I suggest that this person attend an actual worship service of just about any congregation (including the one I belong to) and observe for about five minutes to debunk this theory.

So why would religion be good for kids? The conductor of the study sees three reasons: religious networks provide social support for parents, which can improve their parenting skills; most religious institutions promote self-sacrifice and are pro-family; and religious institutions imbue parenting with sacred meaning and significance. And I would say that those probably are contributing factors.

So why is religion good for kids, in the sense that it results in their behaving better? It starts with parents humbly recognizing that they are sinners saved by a merciful God, and their thankfulness to Him is demonstrated by obedience to His laws. As those who understand this about God and themselves, they also understand that this same saving mercy is necessary for their children, so they instruct them in His ways, and because these parents (in Reformed circles) made some "significant" vows "imbued with sacred meaning" at their children's baptisms, they require that their children obey those same laws as well--or there are consequences. It's a pretty simple formula, and it doesn't always result in good behavior (that sinner part!), but that theme of obedience or consequences would seem to be pretty basic. Unfortunately, that concept of consequences would seem to be lost on most of the general population. I haven't done any studies, but maybe that's a start at explaining it.