Spirituality Study Re-Fielding and Research Symposium

The Institute’s spirituality study was an examination of spirituality in America today that covered the topic with greater depth and breadth than any other contemporary research. The study was developed with a group of research advisors and included a robust qualitative stage that employed the novel technique of “drawing spirituality” and a survey addressing many aspects of spirituality, religion, and their connection to civic life. The report and subsequent analysis has been released over the past several years and resulted in thousands of engagements. Fielded in early 2020, the survey itself was notably “clean” as the research was collected just weeks before the dramatic start to the Covid pandemic. This project would extend the spirituality study research in two meaningful ways: 1) working with NORC at the University of Chicago to re-field the survey in late 2022 or early 2023 to provide a comprehensive pre and post pandemic look at spirituality today. 2) Working with the Social Science Research Council to offer a research symposium centering the spirituality study while bringing in other related research from our partners on language, experiences, identity trends, and democracy and civic life.