The Association of Religion and Spirituality with Obesity and Weight Change in the USA: A Large-Scale Cohort Study

The association between religion, spirituality, and body weight is controversial, given the methodological limitations of existing studies. Using the Nurses’ Health Study II cohort, follow-up occurred from 2001 to 2015, with up to 35,547 participants assessed for the religious or spiritual coping and religious service attendance analyses. Cox regression and generalized estimating equations evaluated associations with obesity and weight change, respectively. Religious or spiritual coping and religious service attendance had little evidence of an association with obesity. Compared with not using religious or spiritual coping at all, the fully adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) were minimally different across categories: a little bit (HR = 1.05, 95% CI: 0.92–1.18), a medium amount (HR = 1.09, 95% CI: 0.96–1.24), and a lot (HR = 1.10; 95% CI: 0.96–1.25) (Ptrend = 0.17). Compared with participants who never or almost never attend religious meetings or services, there was little evidence of an association between those attending less than once/month (HR = 1.08, 95% CI: 0.97–1.10), 1–3 times/month (HR = 1.01, 95% CI: 0.90–1.13), once/week (HR = 0.92, 95% CI: 0.83–1.02), and more than once/week (HR = 0.94, 95% CI: 0.82–1.07) (Ptrend = 0.06). Findings were similar for weight change. There was no significant association between religious or spiritual coping, religious service attendance, obesity, and weight change. While religion and spirituality are prominent in American society, they are not important psychosocial factors influencing body weight in this sample.