Influence of religious coping and religious identity on post COVID-19 well-being among Chinese university students

Abstract

ABSTRACT This research explored how religious coping and religious identity are related to post-pandemic well-being among Chinese university students. The brief RCOPE, Multi-Religion Identity Measure, and post-pandemic well-being scale were administered to 1739 university students. Results showed that religious coping was significantly positively related to post-pandemic well-being, while religious identity was significantly negatively related to post-pandemic well-being beyond demographic variables. The research implicated that university administrators and teachers can use the above inventories to understand religious coping, religious identity, and post-pandemic well-being among university students more comprehensively. Second, professional religious personnel such as Dharma Masters, Preachers, and Imams could promote students’ post-pandemic well-being by increasing their religiousness within legal places of worship. Third, the findings can help students understand the associations between religious coping, religious identity, and post-pandemic well-being, which may stimulate them to improve the latter by increasing their religious coping and religious identity. The significance and limitations of the present research are also discussed.