3. Beliefs
Belief in unseen beings and natural spirits are widespread in the region.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Belief in unseen beings and natural spirits are widespread in the region.
We asked people in 35 countries about the influence of specific religious texts on their national laws. The texts in question varied by country: For example, adults in predominantly Christian countries were asked about the influence of the Bible. And in Muslim-majority countries, they were asked about the influence of the Quran. In most middle-income […]
From the 98% of Indonesians who say religion is very important in their lives to the 96% of Cambodians who burn incense, people in the countries surveyed generally appear to be highly religious, based both on the self-assessed, overall importance of religion in their lives and on a variety of specific religious practices. The survey […]
Few pray daily, but many pray at least occasionally and offer respects to certain religious figures.
Read our deep-dive on religious migration trends in Europe, the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, India and the United States.
40% of U.S. adults say there’s a lot of discrimination against Jews in society, and 44% say there’s a lot of discrimination against Muslims.
Migration outpaced global population growth by 83% to 47% from 1990-2020. Buddhist and Muslim migrants more than doubled in number during this time.
Nearly a quarter of countries used force to prevent religious gatherings during the pandemic; other government restrictions and social hostilities related to religion remained fairly stable.
CORRECTION (Dec. 19, 2025): One chart and some of the text in this chapter have been revised to correct the SHI median scores for the Asia-Pacific region, Europe and the Middle East-North Africa region for 2019. The median scores changed by 0.1 point for these regions in 2019. Refer to the errata page for details. Government restrictions on […]
Few are religiously affiliated, but many in the region hold religious or spiritual beliefs and engage in traditional rituals.
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