Religion and Human Flourishing Conference

Is there a connection between religion and human flourishing? The data suggests there is. Wheatley Institute's Religion and Human Flourishing Conference brought together scholars and research experts from across the country to review the science pointing to religion's central role in human flourishing.

A brief review of the conference can be found here. Full recordings of the conference sessions, as well as speaker bios, are below.

Dr. Byron Johnson is the Director of the Institute for Global Human Flourishing at Baylor University. He is the author of more than 350 journal articles, monographs, and books, focusing much of his professional career on the scientific study of religion, the efficacy of faith-based organizations, and criminal justice. Dr. Johnson is also the project co-director of the Global Flourishing Study. The multi-year data collection has brought researchers from Baylor and Harvard University in partnership with Gallup and the Center for Open Science to gather data from approximately 200,000 participants from 22 countries in order to create an open access resource for researchers, journalists, policymakers, and educators worldwide.

Dr. Justin Dyer is a Professor of Religious Education at Brigham Young University and an affiliated scholar at Wheatley Institute. He received his Ph.D. in human and community development from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, after which he was a postdoctoral fellow at Auburn University. His most recent research examines how religion, family, and mental health influence each other.

Dr. Stephen Cranney is a lecturer and data scientist at the Department of Global Studies at the Catholic University of America. He received a PhD in demography and sociology from the University of Pennsylvania; as a social scientist, he specializes in the areas of religion, fertility intentions (why people want the number of children they do), and sexuality. He is also a Non-Resident Fellow at Baylor University’s Institute for the Studies of Religion.

Dr. Harold Koenig received his geriatric medicine, psychiatry, and biostatistics training at Duke University. He is a leading expert on the intersection of religion and health. Now Professor of Psychiatry and Associate Professor of Medicine at Duke University, he has over 700 scientific peer-reviewed academic publications, 100 book chapters, and 70 books. In 2022, 2024, and 2025, Dr. Koenig was ranked first in the world (lifetime) by ScholarGPS among highly ranked scholars in the academic field of Spirituality and in 2025 he was ranked 18th in the world in the field of Academic Psychiatry.

Dr. Shima Baughman is a law professor, author, and public educator. She is the Woodruff J. Deem Professor of Law at BYU and a Distinguished Fellow at the Wheatley Institute, where she researches how religion improves people’s lives. One of the most cited scholars in her field, she has written three books and more than forty scholarly articles, and her work has been covered in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post.

Dr. Jared Robbins is a Professor of Radiation Oncology at Duke University and Co-Director of the Head and Neck Oncology Program at the Duke Cancer Institute. His research focuses on palliative oncology, compassionate clinician communication, and the role of faith and spiritual well-being in serious illness care. A widely cited educator, he has authored over 130 scholarly publications and chapters, and his work in humanistic oncology has received national recognition through leading clinical organizations and medical health forums.

Dr. Loren Marks is a professor in Brigham Young University’s School of Family Life and serves as a Fellow at the Wheatley Institute. He is co-director of The American Families of Faith Project with David C. Dollahite.

Dr. Pamela King is the Peter L. Benson Associate Professor of Applied Developmental Science and Executive Director of the Thrive Center for Human Development at Fuller Theological Seminary. Her research investigates the intersection of spiritual development, moral purpose, and psychological flourishing among adolescents and emerging adults. She has authored more than 100 scholarly publications, including three books, and her research on spiritual thriving has been featured across major faith, psychological, and public health platforms.

Dr. Mike Goodman is a professor of Church History and Doctrine at Brigham Young University. He serves as the Associate Publications Director and editor in chief of the Religious Educator journal for the Religious Study Center. He is a Co-Investigator on the Family Foundations of Youth Development project, a ten-year longitudinal project exploring several aspects of youth development within the context of family and religious faith. He is also a key contributor to the American Families of Faith project, an ongoing national research project studying family and faith since 2001.

Dr. Sam Hardy has a BS in family science from Brigham Young University, and an MA and PhD in developmental psychology from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He is a professor in the Department of Psychology at BYU. His research focuses on religious development, moral development, and identity formation in adolescence and young adulthood. Currently, much of his work is on religious deconversion and reconversion. He is also writing a book on Latter-day Saint teens.

Dr. Antonius Skipper is an associate professor in the Gerontology Institute at Georgia State University. As a key contributor to the American Families of Faith Project, his research broadly examines religion, relationships, and health among middle-aged and older African Americans. Specifically, Dr. Skipper utilizes strength-focused approaches to understanding faith as a contributor to exemplary, strong African American marriages.

Dr. Loren Marks is a professor in Brigham Young University’s School of Family Life and serves as a Fellow at the Wheatley Institute. He is co-director of The American Families of Faith Project with David C. Dollahite.

Dr. Dave Dollahite is Professor of Family Life at Brigham Young University and Co-Director of the American Families of Faith project (AmericanFamiliesOfFaith.byu.edu). He is author of God’s Tender Mercies and coauthor or coeditor of three books: Psychology of Religion and Families, Strengths of Diverse Families of Faith, and Home-Centered Gospel Learning and Living. He and his wife, Mary, have been married for 43 years, have seven children, and four grandchildren.

Samuel Wilkinson is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Yale School of Medicine and is the Associate Director of the Yale Depression Research Program. He graduated from medical school at Johns Hopkins University and completed his psychiatric residency training at Yale University. His research at Yale is centered on improving the quality of care for psychiatric patients and their community. He also studies the role of organized religion in society.