How the Internet is Taking Away America's Religion


Using the internet can destroy your faith. That’s the conclusion of a study showing that the dramatic drop in religious affiliation in the U.S. since 1990 is closely mirrored by the increase in internet use.

Back in 1990, about 8 per cent of the U.S. population had no religious preference. By 2010, this percentage had more than doubled to 18 per cent. That’s the difference of about 25 million people, all of whom have somehow lost their religion.

That raises an obvious question: how come? Why are American losing their faith?

Today, we get a possible answer thanks to the work of Allen Downey, a computer scientist at the Olin College of Engineering in Massachusetts, who has analysed the data in detail. He says that the demise is the result of several factors but the most controversial of these is the rise of the internet. He concludes that the increase in internet use in the last two decades has caused a significant drop in religious affiliation.

Downey’s data comes from the General Social Survey, a widely respected sociological survey carried out by the University of Chicago, that has regularly measured people’s attitudes and demographics since 1972.
In that time, the General Social Survey has raised people questions such as: ‘what is your religious preference?’ and ‘in what religion were you raised?’ It also collects data on each respondent’s age, level of education, socioeconomic group, and so on. The total data set that Downey used consists of responses from almost 9,000 people.

Downey’s approach is to determine how the drop in religious affiliation correlates with other elements of the survey such as religious upbringing, socioeconomic status, education, and so on.

He finds that the biggest influence on religious affiliation is religious upbringing – people who are brought up in a religion are more likely to be affiliated to that religion later.

However, the number of people with a religious upbringing has dropped since 1990. It’s easy to imagine how this inevitably leads to a fall in the number who are religious later in life. In fact, Downey’s analysis shows that is an important factor. However, it cannot account for all of the fall or anywhere near it. In fact, that data indicates that it only explains about 25 per cent of the drop.

He goes on to show that college-level education also correlates with the drop. Once it again, it’s easy to imagine how contact with a wider group of people might contribute to a loss of religion.

Since the 1980s, the fraction of people receiving college level education has increased from 17.4 per cent to 27.2 per cent in the 2000s. So it’s not surprising that this reflected in the drop in numbers claiming religious affiliation today. But although the correlation is statistically significant, it can only account for about 5 per cent of the drop, so some other factor must be involved.

That’s where the internet comes in. In the 1980s, internet use was essentially zero, but in 2010, 53 per cent of the population spent two hours per week online and 25 per cent surfed more than 7 hours.

This increase closely matches the decrease in religious affiliation. In fact, Downey calculates that it can account for about 25 per cent of the drop.

That’s a fascinating result. It implies since 1990, the increase in internet use has had as powerful an influence on religious affiliation as the drop in religious upbringing.

At this point, it’s worth spending a little time talking about the nature of these conclusions. What Downey has found is correlations and any statistician will tell you that correlations do not imply causation. If A is correlated with B, there can be several possible explanations. A might cause B, B might cause A, or some other factor might cause both A and B.

But that does not mean that it is impossible to draw conclusions from correlations, only that they must be properly guarded. “Correlation does provide evidence in favour of causation, especially when we can eliminate alternative explanations or have reason to believe that they are less likely,” says Downey.

For example, it’s easy to imagine that a religious upbringing causes religious affiliation later in life. However, it’s impossible for the correlation to work the other way round. Religious affiliation later in life cannot cause a religious upbringing (although it may colour a person’s view of their upbringing).

It’s also straightforward to imagine how spending time on the internet can lead to religious disaffiliation. “For people living in homogeneous communities, the internet provides opportunities to find information about people of other religions (and none) and to interact with them personally,” says Downey. “Conversely, it is harder (but not impossible) to imagine plausible reasons why disaffiliation might cause increased internet use.”

There is another possibility, of course: that of a third unidentified factor causes both increased internet use and religious disaffiliation. But Downey discounts this possibility. “We have controlled for most of the obvious candidates including income, education, socioeconomic status, and rural/urban environments,” he says.

If this third exists, it must have specific characteristics. It would have to be something new that was increasing in prevalence during the 1990s and 2000s, just like the internet. “It is hard to imagine what that factor might be,” says Downey.

That leaves him in little doubt that his conclusion is reasonable. “Internet use decreases the chance of religious affiliation,” he says.

But there is something else going on here too. Downey has found three factors – the drop in religious upbringing, the increase in college-level education and the increase in internet use – that together explain about 50 per cent of the drop in religious affiliation.

But what about the other 50 per cent? In the data, the only factor that correlates with this is date of birth – people born later are less likely to have a religious affiliation, But as Downey points out, year of birth cannot be a causal factor. “So about half of the observed change remains unexplained,” he says.

So that leaves us with a mystery. The drop in religious upbringing and the increase in internet use seem to be causing people to lose their faith. But something else about modern life that is not captured in this data is having an even bigger impact.

The Daily Mail reported the same story in ‘Losing our religion: New research shows the Internet could make Americans lose faith,’ www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2597891/Losing-religion-New-research-shows-religion-declined-Internet-use-increased.html, 4 April 2014

 New research has shown a correlation between the rise of the internet and the decline of Americans claiming religious affiliation.

Other factors, such as an increase in higher education, are also implicated, but according to Allen Downey, a computer scientist at the Olin College of Engineering in Massachusetts, the increase in internet use has a significant correlation.

The MIT Technology Review reports that in 1990, eight per cent of Americans had no religious affiliation. In 2010, that figure stands at 18 per cent or 25 million people.

Downey analysed data from the General Social Survey, a well-respected annual research survey carried out by the University of Chicago, to make his findings.

Downey says the biggest cause of religious affiliation is upbringing: those you are raised in religious households are much more likely to remain in their family’s religion as adults.

However, since 1990, the number of people who had religious upbringings has fallen, leading to a decrease in religious individuals – but Downey says that can only account for 25 per cent of the drop.

Higher education at the college level is also correlated with the drop in religion, but although the number of people receiving a college education has increased 10 per cent since the 1980s, Downey suggests it only accounts for a fiver per cent drop.

By far the largest factor, says Downey, is internet use.

In the 1980s, internet use was virtually non-existent, but in 2010, 53 per cent of people spent two hours online a week and 25 per cent spent more than seven hours.

Downey is careful to note that his research has revealed a correlation and not a causation. A relationship between the rise of the internet and the drop in religion exists, but one is not directly responsible for the other.
Downey says that his research has controlled for ‘most of the obvious candidates, including income, education, 
socioeconomic status, and rural/urban environments’ to discount a third factor, one that is responsible for the rise of internet use and the drop in religiosity.

However, that still leaves a 45 per cent drop in religious affiliation that is accounted for.

‘About half of the observed change remains unexplained,’ Downey told the MIT Technology Review.

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