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Frequency of prayer

Alongside with participation rate, the frequency of prayer also declined from 2000 to 2008 in East and West Germany. Thus, while in 2000 38,2% of the respondents in West Germany and 16,6% in East Germany stated that they pray to God at least once a week, the number is only 30,8% and 12% in 2008.

Frequency of prayer in 2000 and 2008 (in %)

Question: “How often do you pray to God outside of religious services? Would you say ...”

	West		East
	2000	2008	2000	2008
Every day	12,9	10,7	5,9	4,8
More than once week	16,2	12,2	7,1	4,5
Once a week	9,1	7,9	3,6	2,7
At least once a month	8,4	9,7	4,1	1,8
Several times a year	7,1	9,5	5,5	4,1
Less often	13,1	17,4	7,0	7,2
Never	27,6	27,4	65,4	72,4
No answer	4,1	2,7	1,1	2,4
Don’t know	1,4	2,7	0,3	0,2

Source: World Values Surveys/European Values Studies; own calculations.

Frequency of prayer in 1990 (in %)

Question: “How often do you pray to God outside of religious services? Would you say ...”

	West	East
Often	20,2	11,8
Sometimes	22,3	12,5
Hardly ever	16,5	7,5
Only in times of crisis	11,6	12,9
Never	21,8	50,3
No answer	0,4	0,6
Don´t know	7,2	4,4

Source: World Values Surveys/European Values Studies; own calculations.

D 14 September 2012 AMatthias Koenig ASabine Trittler