Table 4.
Robustness to Unmeasured Confounding (E-Valuesa) for Assessing the Causal Associations Between Religious Upbringing in Adolescence and Health and Well-Being in Young Adulthood (n = 5,681–7,458a), Growing Up Today Study, 2007, 2010, or 2013
| Health and Well-Being Outcome | Religious Service Attendance | Prayer or Meditation | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| For Effect Estimateb | For CI Limitc | For Effect Estimateb | For CI Limitc | |
| Life satisfaction | 1.50 | 1.28 | 1.47 | 1.25 |
| Positive affect | 1.64 | 1.44 | 1.58 | 1.38 |
| Self-esteem | 1.33 | 1.00 | 1.36 | 1.07 |
| Emotional processing | 1.20 | 1.00 | 1.50 | 1.28 |
| Emotional expression | 1.23 | 1.00 | 1.56 | 1.35 |
| Frequency of volunteering | 1.90 | 1.72 | 2.12 | 1.93 |
| Sense of mission | 1.90 | 1.71 | 2.32 | 2.11 |
| Forgiveness of others | 3.15 | 2.88 | 3.68 | 3.37 |
| Registered to vote | 1.21 | 1.11 | 1.21 | 1.08 |
| Number of physical health problems | 1.16 | 1.00 | 1.36 | 1.10 |
| Overweight/obesity | 1.11 | 1.00 | 1.00 | 1.00 |
| Depressive symptoms | 1.47 | 1.25 | 1.39 | 1.13 |
| Depression diagnosis | 1.56 | 1.00 | 1.53 | 1.00 |
| Anxiety symptoms | 1.23 | 1.00 | 1.23 | 1.00 |
| Anxiety diagnosis | 1.50 | 1.00 | 1.25 | 1.00 |
| Probable posttraumatic stress disorder | 2.12 | 1.36 | 1.32 | 1.00 |
| Cigarette smoking | 1.63 | 1.25 | 1.50 | 1.03 |
| Binge drinking | 1.21 | 1.00 | 1.43 | 1.00 |
| Marijuana use | 1.70 | 1.53 | 2.00 | 1.81 |
| Any other illicit drug use | 2.35 | 1.77 | 2.97 | 2.26 |
| Prescription drug misuse | 1.67 | 1.29 | 2.12 | 1.74 |
| Number of lifetime sexual partners | 1.90 | 1.73 | 2.23 | 2.06 |
| Early sexual initiation | 2.45 | 1.92 | 2.21 | 1.67 |
| History of sexually transmitted infections | 1.85 | 1.29 | 2.72 | 1.88 |
| Teen pregnancy | 1.96 | 1.00 | 1.53 | 1.00 |
| Abnormal Pap test | 1.74 | 1.29 | 2.04 | 1.53 |
Abbreviation: CI, confidence interval.
a See VanderWeele and Ding (33) for the formula for calculating E-values.
b The E-values for effect estimates are the minimum strength of association on the risk ratio scale that an unmeasured confounder would need to have with both the exposure and the outcome to fully explain away the observed associations of religious service attendance (at least weekly vs. never) and prayer or meditation (at least daily vs. never) with various health outcomes as shown in the last column of Tables 2 and 3, conditional on the measured covariates. For example, an unmeasured confounder would need to be associated with both religious service attendance and forgiveness of others by risk ratios of 3.15 each, above and beyond the measured covariates, to fully explain away the observed association between at least weekly religious service attendance and forgiveness of others.
c The E-values for the limit of the 95% CI closest to the null denote the minimum strength of association on the risk ratio scale that an unmeasured confounder would need to have with both the exposure and the outcome to shift the confidence interval to include the null value, conditional on the measured covariates. For example, an unmeasured confounder would need to be associated with both religious service attendance and forgiveness of others by 2.88-fold each, above and beyond the measured covariates, to shift the lower limit of the CI for the observed association between at least weekly service attendance and forgiveness of others to include the null value.