Religious affiliation and psychiatric diagnosis: the influence of Christian sect membership on diagnosis distribution

Minority religions, sects and cults are an increasingly common socio-cultural phenomenon, of which the effects concerning mental health and illness are still poorly understood. In the present study, we compared socio-demographical and clinical characteristics between members of Christian sects and the remaining general inpatient population admitted to a psychiatric clinic in Germany between 1978 and 1991. In comparison to the general patient population, Christian sect patients presented significantly more frequently with a diagnosis of functional psychoses (P < 0.02) and less frequently with diagnoses of neuroses (P < 0.10). Dissimilarities among sub-cultural groups in help-seeking behavior are suggested to explain the heterogeneous diagnoses distribution found in the study.