My newly published research in the European Economic Review finds that the introduction of Covid-related restrictions on houses of worship led to a substantial decline in subjective well-being and an increase in social isolation among religious adherents relative to non-religious people.
Using a sample of 50,000 Americans surveyed between 2020 and 2021, I find that the adoption of these restrictions reduced current life satisfaction and made it more probable that religious people would isolate themselves. These effects remained after controlling for demographics, income, political affiliation, industry, and occupation—and they wiped away nearly half of the life-satisfaction advantage that religious people generally enjoy over the non-religious. Limits on exactly how many people can gather were associated with more harm than were percentage caps on occupancy.
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