By Ziquan Miao
159 patients at McLean hospital, a psychiatric institution affiliated with Harvard Medical School were asked how strongly they believed in a god. As we know in both modern psychiatry and organized religion are places people turn to during times of mental and emotional stress. In fact, there is surprisingly little study on the effect of organized religion and other forms of spirituality as treatment for mental illnesses. The group sampled all had prominent symptoms of depression, which was assessed before being admitted as well as after when they were released.
The researchers asked the patients how strongly they believed in god and attempted to quantify the patient’s faith on a five point scale They were also asked on the credibility of their treatment and effectiveness that the treatment would provide in relieving their symptoms. As it turns out, Seventy-one percent of the patients reported that they had some faith in god or a higher spiritual power. Furthermore, patients who were firm believers of god tended to have better outcomes over the course of the treatment which included: relieving depression, reducing occurrences of self-harm, and increases in psychological wellbeing. Other studies have shown that faith in a given treatment is an important predictor to the treatment’s effectiveness which was associated with improved outcomes. Indeed this steadfast faith in a higher order being may be at work offering the little bit of improvement in mental health.