INDIVIDUALS who engaged in “spirituality” — including the practice of religion and meditation — were significantly less prone to hazardous use of alcohol, marijuana, tobacco, and other drugs, findings of researchers at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health suggest.

The Harvard researchers conducted meta-analysis — combining data of 55 longitudinal studies involving more than half a million people — and found that “spiritual engagement” was associated with a 13-per-cent decrease in substance use over time.

Participation in a religious community — including attending a religious service at least once a week — had an even higher association, at 18 per cent.

While there was no suggestion that spirituality was a “cure” for addiction, the results suggested that it could be an important consideration in a holistic approach to substance-abuse prevention and recovery, the researchers concluded.

“Our findings indicate that spirituality may be protective against substance misuse, one of the biggest public health challenges of our time,” the lead author, Dr Howard Koh, the school Professor of the Practice of Public Health Leadership, said.

“For many individuals and families, using spirituality as a resource — whether that be attending religious services, meditating, praying, or seeking others forms of spiritual comfort — may be an avenue to enhance their health.”

The senior author, Dr Tyler VanderWeele, Professor of Epidemiology, said: “Meta-analyses of such longitudinal studies on spirituality and health are rare. This is a sort of once-in-a-decade advance. The consistency of the results across all the studies was striking, with all but a few — including over a dozen studies conducted outside of the US — showing a protective, not detrimental, effect.”

The study was supported by the Templeton Religion Trust and the Lee Family Fund.

Separate research released in January from an NHS Health Survey for England found that young people were more likely to abstain from alcohol than older groups. That research found that, among men, the proportion who had drunk alcohol in the past 12 months increased with age, from 64 per cent of the 16-to-24s, to 86 per cent of the 55-to-64s, remaining at a similar level (84 per cent) of the over-65s.

Among women, the proportion who had drunk alcohol in the past 12 months also increased with age, with some fluctuations, from 72 per cent of the 16-to-24s to 83 per cent of the 55-to-64s, before decreasing to 71 per cent of the over-75s.

For both men and women, the proportion drinking at least once a week increased with age, from 30 per cent of the 16-to-24s, to 55 per cent of the 55-to-74s, then decreasing to 48 per cent of the over-75s.