Changing levels of religious observance through the life course (Religiosity in Switzerland:disentangling age, cohort and period effects) Marion Burkimsher Affiliated to University of Lausanne

Outline  Data  Cohort - age - period trends  Individual flux  Further research and conclusion

Outline  Data  Cohort - age - period trends  Individual flux  Further research and conclusion

Data source: Swiss Household Panel  Started in 1999 with 5074 households (12931 household members), ongoing to present  Added additional respondents in 2004 (2538 households with 6569 household members)  Annually revisit same respondents; children in household added to sample as they become old enough  Religion questions asked each year , then dropped  Questions on religious affiliation, religious attendance and prayer frequency  Many other demographics, opinions, and time-dependent variables included  Website: swisspanel.ch

Data issues  Many ‘missings’ - children not included, waves missing, individual dropouts (~15,000 total sampled min. once)  With additional respondents added in 2004 no apparent discontinuity in trends - reassuring that pre-2004 sample had not become less representative over time  Similar proportion of religious attenders as found in European Social Survey (ESS) - reassuring! (both managed by same organisation in Lausanne, FORS)

Number of waves with valid data on attendance for individuals with data in at least 1 wave

1 Never 2 Only family ceremonies 3 Only religious celebrations 4 Religious celebrations & family events 5 Few times/year 6 About once/month 7 Every 2 weeks 8 Once a week 9 Several times a week 1 Never 2 Occasional 3 Regular Recoding religious attendance (…any religion)

1Never 2 Few times a year 3Once a month 4>once a week 5 Daily/almost daily 1 Never 2 Occasional 3 Frequent Recoding prayer frequency (prayer outside religious services)

1 Protestant / Reformed 2 Roman Catholic 3 Christian Catholic 4 Other Christian 5 Jewish 6 Muslim 7 Other 8 No religion or denomination 1 Protestant 2 Catholic 3 Other 4 None Recoding religious affiliation

Indications of secularisation  Increase in % saying “no religion” from 11% to 16%  Overall decline in regular attenders from 27% to 22%  Increase in proportion who never pray from 28% to 33%

Outline  Data  Cohort - age - period trends  Individual flux  Further research and conclusion

Trends in proportion who attend monthly

Trends in proportion who never attend

Summary of cohort-age-period attendance graphs  Decline in within-cohort attendance rates -> period secularisation?  Attendance decline especially marked amongst 1950s cohorts  Cross-cohort differentials (esp. inter-generational non-replacement  Decline in those who never attend -> age effect?  Increase in proportion who occasionally attend

Trends in proportion who pray frequently

Trends in proportion who never pray

Summary of cohort-age-period prayer graphs  Increase in within-cohort frequent pray rates -> age effect?  Cross-cohort differentials, esp. for <1940s cohorts  Increase in those who never pray -> period effect?  Slight decline in proportion who pray occasionally - opposite to attendance trend -> divergence / polarisation of prayer behaviour

Trends in Protestant affiliation

Trends in Catholic affiliation

Trends in non-affiliation

Summary of cohort-age-period affiliation graphs  There are differences in proportion of Catholics and Protestants by cohort - explained by differential immigration or ????  Affiliation amongst Protestants is quite steady over time, except for some loss amongst 1960s cohorts  Rise in Protestants amongst 1980s cohorts?  Catholic affiliation shows declines across most cohorts, most severe amongst the youngest cohorts  Significant increase in non-affiliation, though still minority

Outline  Data  Cohort - age - period trends  Individual flux  Further research and conclusion

Year-on-year change in religious attendance

Individual flux in religious attendance Respondents with data in >1 wave (N=9363)

Comments  The proportion of respondents who have stayed at the same level of religious attendance across all waves is 39% (for all respondents who have valid responses for >1 year)  The proportion of respondents who have changed level of attendance at some stage is 61%  The proportion of respondents who have at some time been regular attenders is 36% - cf. to annual average attendance rate of ~24% (includes respondents with only 1 wave of data)  The proportion of respondents who at some stage have been ‘never’ attenders is 62%

Individual flux in frequency of prayer Respondents with data in >1 wave (N=9320)

Comments  The proportion of respondents who have stayed at the same level of prayer frequency across all waves is 50% ->Level of prayer is more stable than level of religious attendance  The proportion of respondents who have changed frequency of prayer at some stage is 50%  The proportion of respondents who have at some time have prayed frequently is 56% (cf. to annual average proportion of respondents who pray frequently ~45%)  The proportion of respondents who at some stage have ‘never’ prayed is 47%  The proportion who never attend (17%) is the same as the proportion who never pray (also 17%). However, of the respondents who regularly attend, 5% never pray! And of those who frequently pray, 22% never attend religious services!

Flux in individual affiliation Respondents with data in >1 wave (N=12,236) 84% had same affiliation at every wave observed

Change in individual affiliation 1999 to 2009 Respondents with valid data in 1999 AND % kept same affiliation (N=3348)

Comments  Religious affiliation is considerably more stable than level of attendance or frequency of prayer  The main trend has been towards non-affiliation, more marked amongst Catholics

Outline  Data  Age - period - cohort trends  Individual flux  Further research and conclusion

Further research  Should religiosity (especially attendance) be considered a ‘time-varying variable’?  Rich data source to investigate further, eg. sequence analysis to investigate individual flux in religiosity over time  Associate transitions of attendance with those of prayer and affiliation  Investigate gender differences & other demographics  Investigate increase / decrease in religiosity with life events, eg. partnering, separation, illness, birth of children, etc…  Investigate if any association between change in religious attendance / prayer with change in life satisfaction  Investigate effect of individual’s change in behaviour (eg. religious attendance) on rest of household  Compare Swiss panel data with other countries’ data (eg. British Household Panel)

Secularisation?  It depends exactly what you look at, and where you draw the boundaries.  An increasing proportion of occasional attenders (decline in regular attenders and decline in ‘never’ attenders)  Non-attenders increasingly defining themselves as having no religion rather than affiliated to a denomination  Growth in Protestantism amongst the young?

Thank you!