Our strong desire for materials is generated by spiritual deprivation: how do religious beliefs affect materialism among Chinese?

Why Our Stuff Matters to Our Spirits

Why do some people feel driven to buy more and more, while others seem satisfied with less? This study looks at that question through the lens of everyday life in China, where rapid economic growth has gone hand in hand with booming consumer culture. The authors explore whether having religious beliefs changes how much importance people place on material possessions, and whether a sense of meaning in life helps explain that connection.

Shopping, Status, and the Costs of Wanting More

Materialism is the habit of treating possessions as central to happiness and success: valuing what you own, believing that more things will make you happier, and judging yourself and others by visible signs of wealth. While this mindset can sometimes fuel hard work and innovation, research has repeatedly tied high materialism to lower life satisfaction, weaker relationships, and more selfish or wasteful behavior. In China, decades of fast growth and expanding markets have strengthened consumer desires, and with them, problems such as unethical shopping behaviors and resource waste. Understanding what might rein in these tendencies is important both for personal well-being and for society.

Faith as a Counterweight to Consumer Desire

Many religious traditions speak out against excess, urging people to live modestly and focus on caring for others. Prior studies in Western and some Asian countries suggest that religious people tend to be less materialistic. However, China is home to a large share of people who say they have no religion, even as a significant minority follow folk beliefs or major world faiths such as Buddhism. The authors first asked whether, in this largely nonreligious setting, believers and nonbelievers differ in their attachment to material goods. Using data from nearly 12,000 adults in the 2018 Chinese General Social Survey, they found that people who reported any religious belief went shopping for pleasure less often, even after taking into account age, income, social status, gender, and how often they attended religious activities. Less frequent recreational shopping was used as a practical sign of weaker materialism.

Finding Meaning vs. Chasing It in the Mall

The second part of the research digs into why religious belief might relate to materialism. The authors focused on “meaning in life,” which they broke into two parts: presence of meaning (feeling that life already has clear purpose and significance) and search for meaning (actively trying to find that purpose). Religion, they argue, offers a ready-made framework for answering big questions about life, death, and how to live, and connects people to a community and moral code. To test this, they surveyed 219 adults in Taiwan, recruiting both believers and nonbelievers at a community church event. Participants filled out standard Chinese questionnaires about presence of meaning, search for meaning, and materialism.

How Inner Fulfillment Changes What We Buy

The analyses showed a simple pattern. People with religious beliefs reported more presence of meaning in life and less searching for meaning. Those who felt more meaning were less materialistic, whereas those still searching tended to be more materialistic. When both meaning measures were considered, the direct link between religion and materialism disappeared. In statistical terms, this means that the effect of religion on materialism ran through meaning in life: belief was tied to a stronger sense of meaning and a weaker urge to search, and these inner experiences were tied in turn to lower materialism. Notably, both presence and search played roughly equal roles in explaining the link.

What This Means for Our Relationship with Possessions

To a lay reader, the take-home message is straightforward: people who feel their lives are rich in purpose and significance seem less driven to fill the gap with shopping bags. In this Chinese sample, religious belief was one path to that deeper sense of meaning, and through it, to weaker attachment to material goods. The authors caution that their studies cannot prove cause and effect, and that beliefs and shopping habits may look different in other cultures. Still, their work suggests that tackling excessive materialism may require more than scolding people for overconsumption; it may also involve helping them find lasting meaning beyond what money can buy.

Citation: Bai, B., Mo, Q.L. Our strong desire for materials is generated by spiritual deprivation: how do religious beliefs affect materialism among Chinese?. Humanit Soc Sci Commun 13, 464 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-06834-8

Keywords: materialism, religion, meaning in life, Chinese society, consumer behavior