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The construction of awe in science communication

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Abstract

Awe is a frequently represented and commonly experienced emotion in science communication. According to a popular account of this emotion, awe is an innate and universal human affective experience that occurs when a person evaluates a target as vast, forcing a shift in their worldview. This shift is portrayed in science communication as resulting in an enhanced interest in the scientific material at hand. Based on the latest research in affective science, however, we challenge this narrow version of awe in science communication and instead advocate a broader account of this emotion in line with a constructionist perspective. We argue that there are a variety of awe types in science communication, each with different forms and functions in relation to the mandates within the multiplicity of contexts in this cultural space. We also contend that people’s awe experiences result from their previous interactions with this emotion and the unique affordances provided by the science communication situation.

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... Even science communication and experiences which deal with physically small subject matter, such as insects, tend to do so in the context of physical vastness, such as large congregations of butterflies or glow worms [Lemelin, Boileau & Russell, 2019]. Luna and Bering [2020] challenge this idea of awe as an innate attribute independent of cultural context. They particularly cite developmental psychology literature which argues that emotional expressions are learnt and progressively acquired from an individual's environment and culture [Hoemann et al., 2019]. ...
... As such the authors make a case for what they term a constructionist view of awe illustrating their point with examples, however many of these are centred on science communication in the context of Western culture. For example, Luna and Bering [2020] discuss the role that documentaries play in creating an association between mountains and awe, suggesting that such an association may be only four centuries old. But in making this conclusion, the authors draw only on European examples, neglecting to examine the strong association between mountains and awe in a myriad of other cultures and traditions, including Islam (The Qur'an Al-Hashr 59:21), Persian culture [Karbasi, al-Islam, Shabani & Norouz, 2020] Judaism (Amos 4:13) ["King James Bible", 2022], The Baha'i Faith [Bahá'u'lláh, 1991], Daoist and Chinese philosophy [McIntire, n.d.;Ham & Scheidegger, 2018], Māori culture [Dennis, 2017] and many others [Sinai et al., 2019]. ...
... Additionally, while a global culture of science communication seems to exist, there also appear to be strata of more localised subcultures [Luna & Bering, 2020]. In discussing the culture of science communication in rural and regional Australia, we are in fact exploring a subculture of science communication within the Australian and Western contexts, themselves subcultures of a global, albeit disjointed, culture of science communication [Orthia, Hikuroa, Nabavi, Rochberg & DeVos, 2021]. ...
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Experiences of awe and wonder are vital to science and innovation. In this practice insight we explore how these emotions shape the culture of science communication. In doing so, we examine how exclusively nature- and place-based experiences for awe and wonder are often features of resource-limited settings. We then describe strategies for awe- and wonder-centred science communication beyond reliance on nature or the power of place by detailing a successful hybrid resourcing model in a rural Australian science centre. We finish by describing the role of science communicators in engaging potential collaborators to enable science communication in resource-limited settings.
... Cultures promote the emotions they value through their various products and practices (Mesquita et al., 2017). Recent work has argued that, as a result of historical and cultural contingencies, awe is an especially valued emotion in the English-speaking culture of science communication (Silva Luna & Bering, 2020), 1 with its affective undertones (implicit and explicit) appearing frequently in contemporary popular science media, such as non-fiction books, TV documentaries, and science photography (e.g. Campbell, 2016;Gross, 2018;Kessler, 2012;Sideris, 2017). ...
... Moreover, this emotion is said to serve a variety of goals beyond promoting curiosity and learning, including generating esteem towards scientific objects, entertaining people, and creating a sense of connection with the environment, among other things (Silva Luna & Bering, 2022). These many forms and function are in line with constructionist portrayals of awe (Silva Luna & Bering, 2020) where 'variation is the norm within each emotion category' (Barrett, 2016, p. 40). However, there have been no systematic attempts to register the many ways in which this emotion is represented in science communication, nor how its usage in this particular domain compares to its occurrence in other cultural spaces. ...
... The stereotypical physiognomy in this sense is a raised inner eyebrow, widened eyes, and an open drop-jawed mouth (Shiota et al., 2003). Given the ostensible value placed on this emotion category in the cultural space of science communication (Silva Luna & Bering, 2020), we first hypothesized that picture book biographies of scientists would contain more stereotypical facial expressions of awe than would those of non-scientists. ...
Article
The emotions most valued by a culture tend to be depicted more often, and more saliently, in their cultural products than those that are not. The content of such representations will also vary in relation to the particular mandates (e.g. beliefs, values, norms) of those cultural spaces. In the present research, we conducted a study in three sections that compared systematically the representations of awe in sixty picture book biographies of scientists (n = 60) and sixty picture book biographies of non-scientists (n = 60). The first two sections revealed that the frequency and centrality of awe-related content in the images and text of these materials was significantly higher for the former book type. The third section likewise uncovered differences in the representation of the situations where awe is experienced, as well as the characteristics of characters portrayed as experiencing this emotion between and within the two types of picture books. Together, these findings show that awe is an especially valued emotion in the culture of science communication and that the representation of this affective category in this domain is distinct to how it is represented in other spaces.
... According to Bondebjerg (2014), documentary spectatorship is shaped by its emotional and narrative dimensions, because documentary films tell stories about reality. Some factors associated to an increased affective and cognitive impact in scientific documentaries, such as awakening curiosity and inquiry in the spectator (Pigg et al. 2016), adequate use of narrative style (Borum Chattoo and Feldman 2017), storytelling and vocabulary (Davis and León 2018), using animation (Velho, Mendes, and Azevedo 2020), evoking awe (Luna and Bering 2021) and managing cognitive load to maintain motivation and interest in the audience (Boy, Bucher, and Christ 2020). ...
... According to Silva Luna and Bering (2021), the experience of science communication is closely related to awe, an emotion that has been constructed as universal and integral to social bonding. In science communication, awe is a form of 'epistemic emotion' and is used to generate curiosity and enhance interest in the audience (Luna and Bering 2021, 3). ...
... Still, each practitioner has a unique background through which they have personally navigated the many subcultural spaces of science communication (e.g., nationality, the languages they speak, the scientific disciplines they follow, organizational affiliation, age, level of education, and so on). Of particular interest for the present purposes is the individual's cultural knowledge of the emotion category awe, which is, again, so central to many contemporary practices in science communication (Silva Luna & Bering, 2020). ...
... Our theme construction is closely guided by our reading of the history of awe as it relates to the various mandates within science communication, our sociocultural experience, and the constructionist theoretical approach to this emotion as having many functions within this cultural space (see Silva Luna & Bering, 2020). While our respondents tended to show a preference for one or two themes, for the most part their answers showed a mixture of influences. ...
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Awe is a valued emotion in science communication and assumes a variety of functions in relation to the cultural mandates of the various spaces where it is represented. Based on a reflexive thematic analysis of interviews with 22 science communication practitioners, we constructed seven themes referencing this emotion’s various sociocultural roles in this space. These included the functions of awe in entertainment, curiosity, admiration, revelation, and connection. Drawing from a constructionist view of emotions, we argue that these varieties of awe co-construct many of the differing, and sometimes conflicting, mandates that circulate in the culture of science communication.
... Similarly, the field would benefit from more nuanced study of the variety of self-transcendent emotional and eudaimonic experiences that may be evoked by science media, as well as their potential consequences [Raney et al., 2019]. For example, Luna and Bering [2021] proposed that although feelings of awe in science communication may increase interest in science, there are likely many different "awe types in science communication, each with different forms and functions in relation to the mandates within the multiplicity of contexts in this cultural space" [2021, p. 2]. Future research should continue to interrogate these areas to arrive at a more informed understanding of how science media, communication, and information strategies might be developed and implemented to satisfy public eudaimonic, or truth-seeking, mediated experiences that positively impact science engagement outcomes, such as attitudes, learning, and support [Sinai, Caffery & Cosby, 2022]. ...
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Although many science communicators strive to inspire audiences, scant research has sought to understand how media may evoke inspiration. The present study was a three-condition (modality: text-only, audio-only, and audiovisual) between-subjects experiment examining how media content about the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) motivated participants’ feeling moved, awe, curiosity, rumination, and their inspiration state. The findings revealed no statistical difference between using text or audio content, but that audiovisual content can hinder rumination if self-transcendent emotions are not induced. Findings revealed that content leading participants to feeling moved and experiencing awe should lead to reflective thought, and ultimately, feelings of inspiration.
... However, research suggests there's no universal way to prompt a jaw-dropping reaction in audiences. Awe, which many communicators try to elicit because they feel it can generate curiosity about science, is a learned emotion that emerges from repeated exposure in one's culture and lived experience [Silva Luna & Bering, 2021]. Beyond curiosity, wonder, or awe, fostering connections to people's non-science interests or removing barriers around belonging and identity for marginalized communities might be needed to bring about lasting connections to science [Volpe et al., 2022]. ...
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... ej. investigadores jóvenes, estudiantes de pregrado, etc.) (Bankston & McDowell, 2018;Luna & Bering, 2020;McPhetres, 2019;Mercer-Mapstone & Kuchel, 2015, 2016Miller et al., 2009;O'Connell et al., 2020;Oliveira et al., 2021Oliveira et al., , 2019Ponzio et al., 2018;Rodgers et al., 2018;Silva & Bultitude, 2009;Spektor-Levy et al., 2009). Es decir, también quienes diseñan e imparten estos talleres corren el riesgo de "ir a ciegas". ...
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This paper sets out an argument and approach for moving beyond a primarily arts-based conceptualization of cultural capital, as has been the tendency within Bourdieusian approaches to date. We advance the notion that, in contemporary society, scientific forms of cultural and social capital can command a high symbolic and exchange value. Our previous research [Archer et al. (2014) Journal of Research in Science Teaching 51, 1–30] proposed the concept of “science capital” (science-related forms of cultural and social capital) as a theoretical lens for explaining differential patterns of aspiration and educational participation among young people. Here, we attempt to theoretically, methodologically, and empirically advance a discussion of how we might conceptualize science capital and how this might be translated into a survey tool for use with students. We report on findings from a survey conducted with 3658 secondary school students, aged 11–15 years, in England. Analysis found that science capital was unevenly spread across the student population, with 5% being classified as having “high” science capital and 27% “low” science capital. Analysis shows that levels of science capital (high, medium, or low) are clearly patterned by cultural capital, gender, ethnicity, and set (track) in science. Students with high, medium, or low levels of science capital also seem to have very different post-16 plans (regarding studying or working in science) and different levels of self-efficacy in science. They also vary dramatically in terms of whether they feel others see them as a “science person.” The paper concludes with a discussion of conceptual and methodological issues and implications for practice.
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This indispensable sourcebook covers conceptual and practical issues in research design in the field of social and personality psychology. Key experts address specific methods and areas of research, contributing to a comprehensive overview of contemporary practice. This updated and expanded second edition offers current commentary on social and personality psychology, reflecting the rapid development of this dynamic area of research over the past decade. With the help of this up-to-date text, both seasoned and beginning social psychologists will be able to explore the various tools and methods available to them in their research as they craft experiments and imagine new methodological possibilities.
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The vividly colored, exquisitely detailed, and dramatically lit Hubble Space Telescope images now define how we visualize the cosmos. They do not look like older photographs of the stars nor are they anything like what one sees on a dark night. Yet they appear to present the universe as one might see it, previewing what space explorers and tourists could experience when manned space travel extends humanity’s reach beyond the earth’s orbit. Improved technology, a telescope orbiting high above the earth’s atmosphere and sensitive digital cameras, can seem like an adequate explanation for the brilliant hues and sharp resolution. But there is more behind the images than just advanced instruments. Through a reprisal of Romantic tropes, the Hubble images once again invoke the sublime and they encourage the viewer to experience the cosmos visually and rationally, to see the universe as simultaneously beyond humanity’s grasp and within reach of our systems of knowledge. The book approaches the Hubble images in terms of their scientific, aesthetic, and cultural significance, and through this, a complex understanding of how these images shape our notion of the cosmos emerges. This interdisciplinary approach makes it a book that will appeal to those interested in art history and visual studies, history of science and technology, and media studies. It is also likely to attract readers interested in science fiction, American studies, and landscape studies.
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The sublime evokes our awe, our terror, and our wonder. Applied first in ancient Greece to the heights of literary expression, in the 18th-century the sublime was extended to nature and to the sciences, enterprises that viewed the natural world as a manifestation of God's goodness, power, and wisdom. In The Scientific Sublime, Alan Gross reveals the modern-day sublime in popular science. He shows how the great popular scientists of our time--Richard Feynman, Stephen Hawking, Steven Weinberg, Brian Greene, Lisa Randall, Rachel Carson, Stephen Jay Gould, Steven Pinker, Richard Dawkins, and E. O. Wilson--evoke the sublime in response to fundamental questions: How did the universe begin? How did life? How did language? These authors maintain a tradition initiated by Joseph Addison, Edmund Burke, Immanuel Kant, and Adam Smith, towering 18th-century figures who adapted the literary sublime first to nature, then to science--though with one crucial difference: religion has been replaced wholly by science. In a final chapter, Gross explores science's attack on religion, an assault that attempts to sweep permanently under the rug two questions science cannot answer: What is the meaning of life? What is the meaning of the good life?
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How and when infants and young children begin to develop emotion categories is not yet well understood. Research has largely treated the learning problem as one of identifying perceptual similarities among exemplars (typically posed, stereotyped facial configurations). However, recent meta-analyses and reviews converge to suggest that emotion categories are abstract, involving high-dimensional and situationally variable instances. In this paper we consult research on the development of abstract object categorization to guide hypotheses about how infants might learn abstract emotion categories because the two domains present infants with similar learning challenges. In particular, we consider how a developmental cascades framework offers opportunities to understand how and when young children develop emotion categories.
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Science and analytical thinking have been linked with atheism. We propose dual pathways whereby scientific engagement may have paradoxical effects on belief in God. Logical aspects of science, associated with analytical thinking, are associated with unbelief. However, people can also be awed by scientific information, and awe is associated with feelings of self-transcendence and belief in a mystical God. An exploratory study (supplemental material; N = 322) and Study 1 (N = 490) demonstrated that people interested in science often hold abstract (but not personal) representations of God. This effect was mediated by a predisposition to feel awe. In Studies 2 and 3 (combined N = 570), people experimentally exposed to awe-inspiring scientific content were more likely than control participants to endorse abstract God representations. These findings suggest that scientific engagement does not always erode belief in God. Instead, science-inspired awe can increase representations of God as a mystical cosmic force or as being beyond imagination.
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STS scholarship has long emphasised that science is emotional as well as cognitive and social. A 2014 science festival, Science in the City, held in Copenhagen, provides a case for thick description of emotion within the production and reception of public science communication. For organisers of science communication the overarching aim was to call forth a suite of emotions focused around curiosity and wonder; in contrast, visitor experiences were constituted through the emotions of reading and negotiating science communication. Negative emotions, in particular, were tied to a sense that navigating science communication and producing the ‘right’ emotions can be effortful. Visitors therefore found strategies to resist the behaviours required of them. Consumption of science communication may thus be framed as emotion work, for both producers and consumers: curiosity does not necessarily emerge naturally, while science communication products may themselves require work to negotiate.
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Theories of emotion have often maintained artificial boundaries: for instance, that cognition and emotion are separable, and that an emotion concept is separable from the emotional events that comprise its category (e.g. “fear” is distinct from instances of fear). Over the past several years, research has dissolved these artificial boundaries, suggesting instead that conceptual construction is a domain-general process—a process by which the brain makes meaning of the world. The brain constructs emotion concepts, but also cognitions and perceptions, all in the service of guiding action. In this view, concepts are multimodal constructions, dynamically prepared from a set of highly variable instances. This approach obviates old questions (e.g. how does cognition regulate emotion?) but generates new ones (e.g. how does a brain learn emotion concepts?). In this paper, we review this constructionist, predictive coding account of emotion, considering its implications for health and well-being, culture and development.
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Awe has traditionally been considered a religious or spiritual emotion, yet scientists often report that awe motivates them to answer questions about the natural world, and to do so in naturalistic terms. Indeed, awe may be closely related to scientific discovery and theoretical advance. Awe is typically triggered by something vast (either literally or metaphorically) and initiates processes of accommodation, in which existing mental schemas are revised to make sense of the awe‐inspiring stimuli. This process of accommodation is essential for the kind of belief revision that characterizes scientific reasoning and theory change. Across six studies, we find that the tendency to experience awe is positively associated with scientific thinking, and that this association is not shared by other positive emotions. Specifically, we show that the disposition to experience awe predicts a more accurate understanding of how science works, rejection of creationism, and rejection of unwarranted teleological explanations more broadly.
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The power of nature to both heal and inspire awe has been noted by many great thinkers. However, no study has examined how the impact of nature on well-being and stress-related symptoms is explained by experiences of awe. In the present investigation, we examine this process in studies of extraordinary and everyday nature experiences. In Study 1, awe experienced by military veterans and youth from underserved communities while whitewater rafting, above and beyond all the other positive emotions measured, predicted changes in well-being and stress-related symptoms one week later. In Study 2, the nature experiences that undergraduate students had during their everyday lives led to more awe, which mediated the effect of nature experience on improvements in well-being. We discuss how accounting for people’s emotional experiences during outdoors activities can increase our understanding of how nature impacts people’s well-being.
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Psychological research on emotion perception anchors heavily on an object perception analogy. We present static “cues,” such as facial expressions, as objects for perceivers to categorize. Yet in the real world, emotions play out as dynamic multidimensional events. Current theoretical approaches and research methods are limited in their ability to capture this complexity. We draw on insights from a predictive coding account of neural activity and a grounded cognition account of concept representation to conceive of emotion perception as a stream of synchronized conceptualizations between two individuals, which is supported and shaped by language. We articulate how this framework can illuminate the fundamental need to study culture, as well as other sources of conceptual variation, in unpacking conceptual synchrony in emotion. We close by suggesting that the conceptual system provides the necessary flexibility to overcome gaps in emotional synchrony.
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Debunking myths behind what is known collectively as the new cosmology-a grand, overlapping set of narratives that claim to bring science and spirituality together-Lisa H. Sideris offers a searing critique of the movement’s anthropocentric vision of the world. In Consecrating Science, Sideris argues that instead of cultivating an ethic of respect for nature, the new cosmology encourages human arrogance, uncritical reverence for science, and indifference to nonhuman life. Exploring moral sensibilities rooted in experience of the natural world, Sideris shows how a sense of wonder can foster environmental attitudes that will protect our planet from ecological collapse for years to come.
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The shift from traditional documentary to "factual entertainment" television has been the subject of much debate and criticism, particularly with regard to the representation of science. New types of factual programming that combine documentary techniques with those of entertainment formats (such as drama, game-shows and reality TV) have come in for strident criticism. Often featuring spectacular visual effects produced by Computer Generated Imagery-these programmes blur the boundaries between mainstream science and popular beliefs. Through close analysis of programmes across a range of sciences, this book explores these issues to see if criticisms of such hybrid programmes as representing the "rotting carcass of science TV" really are valid. Campbell considers if in fact; when considered in relation to the principles, practices and communication strategies of different sciences; these shows can be seen to offer more complex and rich representations that construct sciences as objects of wonder, awe and the sublime.
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This book traces the aesthetic of wonder from the romantic period through contemporary philosophy and literature, arguing for its relevance to ecological consciousness. Most ecocritical scholarship tends to overshadow discussions of wonder with the sublime, failing to treat these two aesthetic categories as distinct. As a result, contemporary scholarship has conflated wonder and the sublime and ultimately lost the nuances that these two concepts conjure for readers and thinkers. Economides illuminates important differences between these aesthetics, particularly their negotiation of issues relevant to gender-based and environmental politics. In turn, readers can utilize the concept of wonder as an open-ended, non-violent framework in contrast to the ethos of domination that often surrounds the sublime.
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List of contributors Preface 1. Introduction: emotion, discourse, and the politics of everyday life Lila Abu-Lughod and Catherine A. Lutz 2. Shifting politics in Bedouin love poetry Lila Abu-Lughod 3. Moral discourse and the rhetoric of emotions Geoffrey M. White 4. Engendered emotion: gender, power, and the rhetoric of emotional control in American discourse Catherine A. Lutz 5. Topographies of the self: praise and emotion in Hindu India Arjun Appadurai 6. Shared and solidarity sentiments: the discourse of friendship, play, and anger in Bhatgaon Donald Brenneis 7. Registering affect: heteroglossia in the linguistic expression of emotion Judith T. Irvine 8. Language in the discourse of the emotions Daniel V. Rosenberg 9. Untouchability and the fear of death in a Tamil song Margaret Trawick Index.
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This paper analyses the use of wonder in the TV-series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage (1980). Popular science has been studied extensively (e.g. Broks 2006; Leane 2007; Perrault 2013), and wonder has been studied moderately (e.g. Daston & Park 1998; Fuller 2006; Vasalou 2015). However, there are very few studies of wonder in popular science. This paper explores how and why wonder is used in Cosmos , with the wider aim of understanding uses of wonder in popular science. The studies that discuss wonder in popular science (Fahnestock 1986; Perrault 2013) argue that wonder is used to enthuse the audience about science, but they do not discuss why wonder has this ability, nor whether wonder has other functions. This paper argues that Fuller's (2006) psychological and evolutionary account of wonder can elucidate why wonder has the ability to enthuse; it discerns three senses of ‘wonder’ (related to objects, emotions and attitudes); and it discusses other functions of wonder (existential, aesthetic and ethical). Due to the centrality of astrobiological questions in Cosmos , this paper also highlights the relation of these questions to the senses and functions of wonder in Cosmos .
Article
Beginning with Rachel Carson's small book, The Sense of Wonder, I explore the moral significance of a sense of wonder - the propensity to respond with delight, awe, or yearning to what is beautiful and mysterious in the natural world when it unexpectedly reveals itself. An antidote to the view that the elements of the natural world are commodities to be disdained or destroyed, a sense of wonder leads us to celebrate and honor the more-than-human world, to care for it, to protect its thriving. If this is so, then a sense of wonder may be a virtue, perhaps a keystone virtue in our time of reckless destruction, a source of decency and hope and restraint.
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Researchers have argued for some time that emotions play a significant role in religious life. The purpose of this study is to focus on a religious emotion—awe of God—that has received relatively little attention in the literature. A latent variable model was developed to assess the following core relationships: (1) people who attend worship services more often will be more likely to experience awe of God; (2) greater awe of God will promote a greater sense of congregational cohesiveness (i.e., the belief that fellow church members share common values and beliefs); (3) individuals who participate in cohesive congregations will be more likely to feel they belong in the place where they worship; and (4) a greater sense of belonging in a congregation will be associated with a stronger sense of religious meaning in life. Analysis of data provided by a nationwide sample of middle-aged and older adults provides support for each of these relationships.