Atheism and immaturity

In 2012, a Georgetown University study was published indicating that only about 30 percent of those who grow up in an atheist household remain atheists as adults.

In the United States, the ages 14–17 are very influential in terms of an individual adopting atheism. Of those in the United States who embrace unbelief, many do so in their high school years.

Theodore Beale declared: "... the age at which most people become atheists indicates that it is almost never an intellectual decision, but an emotional one."

The Christian apologist Ken Ammi concurs in his essay The Argument for Atheism from Immaturity and writes: "It is widely known that some atheists rejected God in their childhood, based on child like reasons, have not matured beyond these childish notions and thus, maintain childish-emotional reactions toward the idea of God."

In 2012, a Georgetown University study was published indicating that only about 30 percent of those who grow up in an atheist household are atheists as adults. (For more information, please see: Atheism and its retention rate in individuals).

A 2012 study by the General Social Survey of the social science research organization NORC at the University of Chicago found that belief in God rises with age, even in atheistic nations.

The popular YouTube Christian Shockofgod received many hostile responses from YouTube atheists when he asked atheists for proof and evidence that atheism is true and they could not provide any.

For more information, please see: Atheism and anger and Atheism and bitterness

Paul Vitz and the psychology of atheism

See also: Atheism and poor relationships with parents

It is often argued that a troubled/non-existent relationship with a father may influence one of the causes of atheism. Dr. Paul Vitz wrote a book entitled Faith of the Fatherless in which he points out that after studying the lives of more than a dozen leading atheists he found that a large majority of them had a father who was present but weak, present but abusive, or absent. Dr. Vitz also examined the lives of prominent theists who were contemporaneous to their atheist counterparts and from the same culture and in every instance these prominent theists had a good relationship with his father. Dr. Vitz has also stated other common factors he observed in the leading atheists he profiled: they were all intelligent and arrogant.

See also

• Atheism and children
• Global atheism and aging populations
• Atheism and moral intelligence
• Atheism and profanity
• Atheism and intolerance
• Causes of atheism
• Books on the causes of atheism
• Ex-atheists
• Denials that atheists exist
• Resources for leaving atheism and becoming a Christian
• Evidence for Christianity