STUDY: College students are becoming increasingly less religious, more depressed

According to research conducted by University of California-Los Angeles, 27 percent of college freshmen no longer identify with a certain religion—the highest this trend has seen in 40 years.

According to the study conducted in 2014, among college freshman, 30 percent of men and 25.4 percent of women responded with “none” when asked a religious preference. This is an increase from a 1971 study that recorded 17.3 percent of men and 13.5 percent of women who responded with “none” as their selection.

Hemant Mehta, an author for The Friendly Atheist, touted this increase as a victory. 

“I want this trend to continue because we’re better off living in a society where religion doesn’t have the influence it does now,” Mehta wrote. “A religion-free world won’t solve all of our problems, but it’s hard to instill values like critical thinking and reason in society when religious dogma overrides common sense.”

The same study also showed a profound increase in depression among college freshmen. There is an epidemic of “emotional health issues” within the same students, the study also found.

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