Religious Engagement and Life Satisfaction Among African American and Black Caribbeans: A Nationally Representative Examination

Background and Purpose: As World Health Organization observes, life satisfaction is a key global indicator of health and wellness. Accordingly, research on factors that may contribute to life satisfaction is a priority (Nakamura et al., 2022). Reviews of the extant research on life satisfaction have singled out religious involvement as one area in which additional investigation is needed (Tanwar & Khindri, 2024). In response to these calls, the present study sought to answer the question: how are different dimensions of religious engagement associated with life satisfaction among two understudied, culturally distinct populations: African Americans and Black Caribbeans.

Methods: To conduct this cross-sectional study, we used data from the National Survey of American Life (NSAL). The NSAL employed a national multi-stage probability design to obtain a nationally representative sample of African Americans (N=3,570) and Black Caribbeans (N=1621). Interviews were typically administered face-to-face in respondents’ homes, and the response rate was 71% for African Americans and 77.7% for Black Caribbeans.

In addition to control variables, the study included eight measures of religious engagement, represented four relatively distinct dimensions: 1) organized religious engagement, 2) subjective religiousness, 3) personal religious activities, and 4) religious coping. For the dependent measure, a single-item measure of life satisfaction (“In general, how satisfied are you with your life as a whole these days?”) was used with a four-point Likert-type response key (4=very satisfied, 1=very dissatisfied). Prior research indicates this measure performs similarly to multi-item scales (Cheung & Lucas, 2014; Fukui et al., 2021). All statistical analyses accounted for the complex multi-stage clustered design of the NSAL sample, unequal probabilities of selection, nonresponse, and poststratification to calculate weighted, nationally representative population estimates and standard errors.

Results: Regression analyses for the religious engagement measures and life satisfaction were conducted separately for African American and Black Caribbean respondents. Organized religious involvement was positively associated with life satisfaction for both African Americans and Black Caribbeans. Similarly, the level of subjective religiousness was also positively associated with life satisfaction for both groups. In contrast, both personal religious behaviours and religious coping dimensions were unrelated to life satisfaction in either group.

Conclusions and Implications: We found that two dimensions of religious engagement—organized religious participation and subjective religiousness—were positively associated with life satisfaction among both African Americans and Black Caribbeans. These findings are generally consistent with prior research on religious engagement and life satisfaction using nationally representative samples of European Americans (Koenig et al., 2024) and extends the relationship to African Americans and Black Caribbeans. Longitudinal studies, however, are needed to clarify the role that religious engagement plays in life satisfaction.

Concurrently, the present findings suggest social work practitioners might conduct a spiritual assessment to understand the role religion plays in lives of both African Americans and Black Caribbeans. In clinical settings practitioners tend to overlook religious resources that might be leveraged to help clients ameliorate problems (Meadows et al., 2020). An assessment can identify these strengths, which in turn, can often be operationalized to enhance client wellness (Canda et al., 2020).