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Back in 1990, about 8 percent of the U.S. population had no religious preference.
By 2010, this percentage had more than doubled to 18 percent. That’s a difference of about 25 million people, all of whom have somehow lost their religion.
That raises an obvious question: how come? Why are Americans losing their faith?
Today, we get a possible answer thanks to the work of Allen Downey, a computer scientist at the Olin College of Engineering in Massachusetts, who has analyzed the data in detail.
He says that the demise is the result of several factors but the most controversial of these is the rise of the Internet.
He concludes that the increase in Internet use in the last two decades has caused a significant drop in religious affiliation.
Downey’s data comes from the General Social Survey, a widely respected sociological survey carried out by the University of Chicago, that has regularly measure people’s attitudes and demographics since 1972.
In that time, the General Social Survey has asked people questions such as: “what is your religious preference?” and “in what religion were you raised?”
It also collects data on each respondent’s age, level of education, socioeconomic group, and so on. And in the Internet era, it has asked how long each person spends online. The total data set that Downey used consists of responses from almost 9,000 people. Continue reading.
Source: MIT Technology Review
Image: theamericanjesus.net
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