Natural Scientists Are Less Likely to Believe in God than Are Social Scientists

Scientists in the social sciences are more likely to believe in God and attend religious services than are scientists in the natural sciences, according to a survey by a Rice University sociologist of 1,646 faculty members at elite research universities.

Elaine Howard Ecklund

“Based on previous research, we thought that social scientists would be less likely to practice religion than natural scientists are, but our data showed just the opposite,” says Elaine Howard Ecklund, a postdoctoral fellow in Rice’s Department of Sociology. She presented the preliminary results of her study at last fall’s annual meeting of the Association for the Sociology of Religion.

“Science often is perceived as incompatible with religion and spirituality, but few have asked how scientists themselves think about religion,” Ecklund notes. “So I wanted to examine how academic scientists in the natural and social sciences understand the relationship of religion and spirituality and look at topics ranging from developing a research agenda to ethical decisions involving human subjects and interactions with students.”

The study, funded by a $283,000 grant from the Templeton Foundation, was based on a brief survey conducted online or over the phone. Of the 2,148 initial requests, Ecklund received 1,646 responses—a rate of 75 percent, which, she says, is quite high for social science research. The 36 questions on the survey examined a variety of topics, including religious beliefs, participation in religious services, spiritual practices, and the intersection of spiritual beliefs and research ethics.

When Ecklund compared faculty in the natural science disciplines of physics, chemistry, and biology with those in the social science disciplines of sociology, psychology, political science, and economics, she found “distinct frameworks” for the ways in which individuals view religion and spirituality as well as how they make ethical decisions related to their research. Nearly 38 percent of natural scientists surveyed said they did not believe in God, but only 31 percent of the social scientists gave that response. Among each of the two general groups, one discipline stood out: Forty-one percent of the biologists and 27 percent of the political scientists said they don’t believe in God.

“Now we must examine the nature of these differences,” Ecklund says. “Many scientists see themselves as having a spirituality not attached to a particular religious tradition. Some scientists who don’t believe in God see themselves as very spiritual people. They have a way outside of themselves that they use to understand the meaning of life.”

Ecklund and colleagues are in the process of conducting longer interviews with some of the participants to explore issues in more depth. They will be asked about deeper topics, such as the meaning of life, their understanding of the importance of religious beliefs in their lives, and the perception of conflict between religion and science. The in-depth interviews should be completed within a year, and then Ecklund plans to analyze the results and summarize her findings in a book as well as in several journal articles.