title: Social buffering by God: prayer and measures of stress.
abstract: Social buffering is characterized by attenuation of stress in the presence of others, with supportive individuals providing superior buffering. We were interested in learning if the implied presence of a supportive entity, God, would reduce acute stress. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: prayer, encouraging self-talk, and control. They were subsequently placed in a stressful situation. Self ratings of stress were lower among the prayer and self-talk conditions relative to controls. Systolic and diastolic blood pressures only among those who prayed were lower than controls; however, prayer and self-talk did not differ. Prayer alone did not significantly reduce stress, perhaps because the majority of students in the prayer condition did not consider reading a prayer to constitute praying.
authors.affiliation: Psychology Department, Georgia Southern University, P.O. Box 8041, Statesboro, GA 30460, USA.
authors.forename: Jennifer N
authors.initials: JN
authors.lastname: Belding
authors.forename: Malcolm G
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Howard
authors.forename: Anne M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: McGuire
authors.forename: Amanda C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Schwartz
authors.forename: Janie H
authors.initials: JH
authors.lastname: Wilson
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D029221:Faith Healing; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D012067:Religion; D012069:Religion and Psychology; D012919:Social Behavior; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000523:psychology*; D055815:Young Adult