Our more militant brethren in the science and science media community paint all religious people as intellectually immature but AAAS surveys show nearly 40 percent of AAAS members are religious and a new University of Nebraska-Lincoln study challenges the common belief that more intelligent people are less religious.

Instead, the article in Review of Religious Research contends, education has a positive effect on Americans' churchgoing habits and their emphasis on religion in daily life.

The study analyzed a nationwide sample of thousands of respondents to the General Social Survey. Their analysis determined that education does influence Americans' religious beliefs and activities but the effects are more complicated than conventional wisdom suggests.

For example, the study found higher levels of education eroded Americans' viewpoints that their specific religion is the "one true faith" and that the Bible is the literal word of God. At the same time, education was positively associated with belief in the afterlife.  More highly educated Americans were somewhat less likely to definitely believe in God.

The research also found that disaffiliating, or dropping religion altogether, was not a popular option for highly educated Americans - having a greater level of education was instead associated most often with converting to mainline, non-evangelical Protestant denominations.

"Education influences strategies of action, and these strategies of action are relevant to some religious beliefs and activities, but not others," said Philip Schwadel, associate professor of sociology at UNL and author of the study. "The effects of education on religion are not simple increases or decreases. In many ways, effects will vary, based on how you define religion."

The study is unique, Schwadel said, because it examines education's effects on religion in the various ways that Americans are religious, from their different beliefs, their varied ways of participating and the nature of their affiliations with specific denominations.

Among the study's findings:

• Education had a positive effect on religious participation. For each additional year of education, the odds of attending religious services increased 15 percent.

• Increases in education were associated with reading the Bible. With each additional year of education, the odds of reading the Bible at least occasionally increased by 9 percent.

• Education was related to respondents' switching of religious affiliations. The odds of switching to a mainline Protestant denomination increased by 13 percent for each year of education.

• The more educated respondents were, the more likely they were to question the role of religion in secular society. Yet, they were against curbing the voices of religious leaders on societal issues and supported those leaders' rights to influence people's votes.

"The results suggest that highly educated Americans are not opposed to religion -- even religious leaders stating political opinions," Schwadel said. "But they are opposed to what may be perceived as religion being forced on secular society."

The research illustrates the unique, voluntary American brand of religiosity, he said, and should open up a discussion about the interactions between education and religion in modern American life.

"It's clear that though the religious worldviews of the highly educated differ from the religious worldviews of those with little education, religion plays an important role in the lives of highly educated Americans," Schwadel said. "And religion remains relevant to Americans of all education levels."