The more likely Americans have a stronger sense of identity, the more likely they read the Bible: Study

According to the latest installment in the Bible’s State of America Report, the more likely Americans are to interact with the Bible, the more likely they have to have a stronger sense of identity.

The American Bible Society published chapter six of its “Bible USA 2025 State 2025” report on Thursday. The study examines sense of identity among American citizens based on responses collected from 2,656 American adults in online interviews conducted between January 2 and January 21.

“The level of identity is strong among people who practice religion as well as Christianity,” said the state of John Farker Prake, Chief Innovation Director of the American Bible Society and Bible Editor-in-Chief. “What’s about core beliefs, shared worship, something about common culture gives people a better sense of who they are.”

The researchers measured the level of respondents’ agreement with statements declaring “I know who I am,” “I always have a good sense of what is important to me,” and “I know what I believe and what I value.”

Decomposition of results by religious affiliation revealed that practiced Christians have the strongest sense of identity, with 64% being classified as having a strong identity.

At the same time, 52% of respondents who stuck to another religion besides Christianity had a strong identity. The proportion of nominal Christians (40%), casual Christians (33%), and religiously unrelated respondents (33%) who had a strong sense of identity were much lower.

A similar pattern emerged when classifying respondents by level of biblical involvement.

Sixty-three percent of individuals involved in the Bible were defined as those who had achieved over 100 on the Bible engagement scale and had a strong sense of identity. Meanwhile, only 38% of the “Movable Middle” and “Bible Released” categories who received lower scores on the Biblical Engagement Scale had a strong sense of identity.

Frequent use of the Bible is also correlated with a strong sense of identity, researchers believe.

The report defines the use of the Bible as having connections with non-church Bibles at least three times a year. Of those who use the Bible every day, 69% reported a strong sense of identity. The majority of respondents who used the Bible several times a week (51%) and half of those who used the Bible at least four times a week had strong identities.

A strong sense of identity was less frequent among those who used once a week (45%), once a year or twice a year, once a year or twice a year (41%), three or four times a year (38%) (38%) (38%) (38%) (38%) (38%) (38%) (38%) (33%).

“When people build their own lives on top of it, not just reading the Bible, they are much more likely to have a strong sense of identity,” Preking emphasized.

Among generations, data show that “the lowest percentage of people in the strong identity group of Gen Z Men” (30%) and the highest percentage of people in the weak identity group (30%). Meanwhile, 41% of Gen Z Women say they have a strong identity, while 23% say they have a weak identity.

The sense of identity appears to “reinforce with age,” the researchers wrote in their study.

“More than half of the Boomer+ generation, both women and men are in a strong identity group,” they wrote. “Young people are still young and can argue that they have permission to not be confident in their identity. As we get older, we learn more about who we are, what we believe, and what we think is important.”