7 out of 10 Americans consider themselves spiritual: survey

It remains unclear whether spirituality, whatever that might mean, is increasing among Americans.

by Alejandra O’Connell-Domenech | Dec. 07, 2023

A detail of “The Righteous Shall Receive a Crown of Glory,” Brainard Memorial Window for Methodist Church, Waterville, New York, ca. 1901 is photographed while on display at the “Louis C. Tiffany and the Art of Devotion” exhibit at the Museum of Biblical Art in New York on Thursday, Oct. 25 2012. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer, File)

Story at a glance

A new Pew Research Center survey found that most U.S. adults say they are spiritual “in some way.”

But what spirituality means differs among people.

Most believe that having a connection with something larger than themselves is essential to being spiritual.

While more Americans are distancing themselves from organized religion, most U.S. adults say they are spiritual.

A survey from the Pew Research Center published Thursday found 7 out of 10 adults say they are “spiritual in some way.”

It’s unclear if spirituality, whatever that might mean, is increasing among Americans.

“Because this is the first time Pew Research Center has asked many of these questions about beliefs, practices and experiences that may be viewed as spiritual, we do not know whether they are more—or less—common today than they were in the past,” a report with Pew’s survey findings states.

But previous Pew studies found that more Americans are turning away from Christianity and are not identifying with any particular religion, or are considering themselves religious “nones.”

To find out what Americans mean when they say they are spiritual, Pew asked survey respondents to explain in their own words what the word means to them.

Pew found that 27 percent of people define spirituality as having beliefs or faiths in line with organized religion, like the belief in God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, elements of Christian theology or obedience to religious teachings.

Another 24 percent of people said that being spiritual is about connections either with God or with one’s inner self.

Most spiritual Americans—74 percent—said that being “connected with something bigger than myself” is essential to what being spiritual means to them. And 70 percent said that being “connected with God” is essential to what the term means to them.

One in 10 people said that the term is related to “understanding themselves or guiding their own behavior,” according to the survey.

“These open-ended responses illustrate the difficulty of separating ‘spirituality’ from ‘religion’ and suggest that for many Americans, there is no clear dividing line,” the report states.