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A recent study found that adolescents and youths brought up in a religious or spiritual environment may be less susceptible to drug abuse and to depression.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Researchers who worked on the study that was published in the\u00a0American Journal of Epidemiology<\/i>\u00a0said that\u00a0youths who participated in religious services every week or prayed \/ meditated every day benefited from a wide range of positive results.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The results of this study tally with those of a study published last month that found that youths\u00a0whose parents placed importance on religion or spirituality\u00a0were\u00a0less at risk of committing suicide.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The researchers found that when compared with others, youths who attended religious services regularly were 12 percent less likely to fall into depression, 33 percent less likely to abuse\u00a0of drugs, 18 percent more likely to feel content and 87 percent more likely to forgive.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Youths who prayed often were 40 percent less likely to\u00a0catch a sexually transmitted disease, 39 percent more likely to do voluntary work in the community and 47 percent more likely to have a sense of mission and an aim in life.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n People who have had a good upbringing\u00a0or who involve themselves in the community enjoy a number of health benefits. The results of the study could be partly explained by the fact that religion could fill the void that other youths seek to fill\u00a0through vices.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Gail\u00a0Saltz, Professor of Psychiatry at the Presbyterian Hospital in New York said,\u00a0among other things, that religion provides a community of persons that think along the same lines and this is important to both parents and children.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n This does not mean that parents should suddenly start encouraging their children to attend religious activities if they do not do so themselves. This strategy could lead the children to rebel.\u00a0 In fact,\u00a0Saltz\u00a0warns parents not to send their children to religious functions they themselves avoided when they were young.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n A recent study found that adolescents and youths brought up in a religious or spiritual environment may be less susceptible to drug abuse and to depression.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Researchers who worked on the study that was published in the\u00a0American Journal of Epidemiology<\/i>\u00a0said that\u00a0youths who participated in religious services every week or prayed \/ meditated every day benefited from a wide range of positive results.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The results of this study tally with those of a study published last month that found that youths\u00a0whose parents placed importance on religion or spirituality\u00a0were\u00a0less at risk of committing suicide.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The researchers found that when compared with others, youths who attended religious services regularly were 12 percent less likely to fall into depression, 33 percent less likely to abuse\u00a0of drugs, 18 percent more likely to feel content and 87 percent more likely to forgive.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Youths who prayed often were 40 percent less likely to\u00a0catch a sexually transmitted disease, 39 percent more likely to do voluntary work in the community and 47 percent more likely to have a sense of mission and an aim in life.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n People who have had a good upbringing\u00a0or who involve themselves in the community enjoy a number of health benefits. The results of the study could be partly explained by the fact that religion could fill the void that other youths seek to fill\u00a0through vices.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Gail\u00a0Saltz, Professor of Psychiatry at the Presbyterian Hospital in New York said,\u00a0among other things, that religion provides a community of persons that think along the same lines and this is important to both parents and children.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n This does not mean that parents should suddenly start encouraging their children to attend religious activities if they do not do so themselves. This strategy could lead the children to rebel.\u00a0 In fact,\u00a0Saltz\u00a0warns parents not to send their children to religious functions they themselves avoided when they were young.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A recent study found that adolescents and youths brought up in a religious or spiritual environment may be less susceptible to drug abuse and to depression.\u00a0 Researchers who worked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1834,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"spay_email":""},"issuem_issue":[78],"issuem_issue_categories":[9],"issuem_issue_tags":[],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"2.8.8","language":"en","enabled_languages":["mt","en"],"languages":{"mt":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/1841"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/article"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1841"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/1841\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1854,"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/1841\/revisions\/1854"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1834"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"issuem_issue","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issuem_issue?post=1841"},{"taxonomy":"issuem_issue_categories","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issuem_issue_categories?post=1841"},{"taxonomy":"issuem_issue_tags","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/weekly.uhm.org.mt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issuem_issue_tags?post=1841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}