Religious identity in the semantic self-regulation of youth

Abstract

The article presents an analysis of the links between the religious identity of young people and their ideas about the meanings of life, family, education, work in dynamics (2017-2020), including through connection with the choice of life strategies (stability /change), behavior patterns (reliability and calm / change and risk). Based on the comparative analysis of the data of two studies, the authors draw conclusions about the ambiguous manifestation of religious identity in the self-regulation of the life of young people. In different periods, it activates both traditional and modern meanings. For believers, compared with non-believers, love is understood much broader than the love between a man and a woman is more significant as the meaning of life. Along with the uncertainty-avoidance attitude inherent in believers, during the Covid-19 pan- demic, the value of a calm and comfortable life among them is significantly increased. The existential meanings of "manifestation of one's individuality (self-realization)" and "striving for truth", correlated with modern culture, are less valuable for believers than for non-believers. The ratio of the terminal and instrumental meanings of the family practically does not differ between believers and non-believers, but the significance of the terminal mean- ings themselves changes: for believers, “love” is less significant, but “need for a fam- ily” is higher. The ratio of terminal and instrumental meanings of labor is also similar. However, believers are characterized by the increased importance of the meaning of work as earnings during the COVID-19 pandemic. An analysis of the meanings of education shows the most pronounced instrumentalization among young believers than non-believers. The instrumentalization of the meanings of work and education is also associated with an attitude to avoid uncertainty in this group.