title: Religiousness, social support and subjective well-being: An exploratory study among adolescents in an Asian atheist country.
abstract: Few studies have focused on the relationships among religiousness, social support and subjective well-being in Chinese adolescent populations. This study tries to fill this gap. Using cluster sampling, we selected two groups: Group A, which included 738 Tibetan adolescents with a formal religious affiliation and represented adolescents from a religious culture, and Group B, which included 720 Han adolescents without a religious affiliation and represented adolescents from an irreligious culture. Structural equation modelling showed that only in Group A did social support mediate (partially) the relationship between religious experience and subjective well-being; furthermore, the results of a hierarchical regression analysis showed that only in Group A did social support moderate the relationship between religious ideology and subjective well-being. Possible explanations for the discrepancies between the findings obtained in this study and those obtained in previous studies are discussed.
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an, China.
authors.forename: Chengting
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ju
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an, China.
authors.forename: Baoshan
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an, China.
authors.forename: Xuqun
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: You
authors.affiliation: Department of Management, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA.
authors.forename: Valeria
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Alterman
authors.affiliation: School of Public Management, Yunnan University of Finance and Economics, Kumming, China.
authors.forename: Yongkang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Li
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001208:Asia; D002669:Child Welfare / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010684:Philosophy; D012069:Religion and Psychology; D012944:Social Support
keywords: Adolescents; Religious culture; Religiousness; Social support; Subjective well-being