THE COSTS AND BENEFITS OF BOUNDARY MAINTENANCE - STRESS, RELIGION ANDCULTURE AMONG JEWS IN BRITAIN

This paper examined stress among two groups of orthodox Jews suggested to differ in the strength of the boundary of their religious group. C omparisons were made between the two groups, and with urban and rural groups studied by other researchers. Proportions of boundary-maintenan ce events (events whose threat had been caused or exacerbated by Jewis hness) and of severe events, and proportions and rates of regular, irr egular and disruptive events were examined. Boundary-maintenance event s were higher among the more religiously orthodox affiliated group, an d among whom religious observance was indeed reported to be higher. It was suggested that conditions of higher boundary maintenance would be associated with higher rates and proportions of regular events and wi th lower rates and proportions of irregular and disruptive events. Gen erally, the analyses supported this expectation. Boundary-maintenance events themselves were somewhat less severe, though not less likely to be irregular or disruptive than other events. Depression was shown to be unrelated to boundary-maintenance events and (surprisingly) unrela ted to contextual threat when the effects of irregularity-disruption w ere controlled. Depression was, however, strongly related to irregular and disruptive events. The results are compared with those of related work, and suggest that the general lowering effect of affiliation to a religious group may be partly explained by the effects of boundary m aintenance, which involves stress, but of a less depressogenic kind th an the disruptive stress associated with conditions of low/no boundary maintenance. The findings have implications for understanding the rel ations between culture and mental disorder.