Good for All

Abstract:

How we value our day-to-day practices has an impact on our perception of their utility and our experiences of them. The same principle applies to our valuation of religious and spiritual practices like meditation, prayer, and attendance, and how they influence our subjective appraisal of our own happiness and well-being. If we don’t all value a practice equally, can we universally determine its effect on our health? Investigate how Dr. Speed’s keen insights on the importance of coherency theory and the reliability of religious and spiritual variables as accurate predictors of health help to highlight cultural misconceptions.

About the Author: Dr. David Speed

Dr. David Speed an Associate Professor at the University of New Brunswick in the Department of Psychology. His research focuses on challenging the commonly held belief that religion and spirituality inherently lead to better health outcomes. While numerous studies suggest that religious attendance, prayer, and religiosity are correlated with improved health outcomes, there are significant gaps and inaccuracies in the existing literature.

Through his research, Dr. David Speed highlights the lack of confirmatory evidence that being nonreligious is detrimental to health. His work indicates that atheists do not necessarily fare worse than believers, suggesting that the health benefits attributed to religion and spirituality are overstated. Dr. Speed’s research critiques the prevailing assumptions in the field and addresses the complexities of studying the growing nonreligious population.