The least afraid of death are deeply religious people and atheists, found out the experts of the Oxford University.
The results of the study are published in the journal Religion, Brain & Behaviour.
During the experiment, the researchers analyzed 100 studies over 1961-2014 years and found some correlation between the degree of religiosity and fear of death at 26 thousand people across the world.
The results showed that the fear of death overcomes the people that are very loyal to religion and obviously believe in life after death, and those who do not believe in God.
However, scientists have divided religious beliefs: internal and external. In the first case, religious beliefs are formed under the influence of the privileges of commitment to religion (e.g., membership of a particular social group), the second is based on personal beliefs. Fear of death in people from the second group was lower.
It is accepted that religious people fear death less than non-religious, but the results do not fit into this pattern, the researchers note. They suggest that perhaps people who are not afraid of death, simply do not need to seek salvation in religion.
