Flipping out in Israel is overrated

Study finds religious changes to be minimal

By Michael Orbach

Issue of June 5, 2009 / 13 Sivan 5769

The year in Israel may not be as pivotal to religious development as was previously thought, according to a new study published by the Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and University-School Partnership, an Azrieli affiliate.

The study, coauthored by Dr. David Pelcovitz, the Gwendolyn and Joseph Straus Chair in Psychology and Jewish Education at Azrieli, and Rabbi Steven Eisenberg, the Mordecai Zeitz Doctoral Fellow at Azrieli, found that while students increased in religiosity over their year in Israel, the changes were relatively minor. The “brainwashing” staple of the year in Israel, the Pelcovitz-Eisenberg study indicates, may simply be a myth.

“We’re not talking about jumps, we’re looking at less than one point –– the changes were incremental and small,” Eisenberg explained to The Jewish Star. “People increase but a large part of their growth starts at a baseline they got in high school.”

The study took 229 seniors from six Modern Orthodox high schools in the tri-state area who were spending the next year in an Israeli yeshiva or seminary and interviewed them across a set of criteria including long term goals, dress standards, going to college, and becoming a rabbi or teacher.

The following year, the study followed up on 70 percent of the students in Israel and interviewed an additional 450 students, bringing the total to 600 students. Using the high school seniors as a baseline, it examined the change the students reported. The study found that most students reported moderate changes, with the strongest being in clothing and some changing their college plans. Most surprisingly, the study found that the most important factors in the change students experienced were social factors like family and friends, high school teachers, and being imbued with a positive outlook on Judaism.

“The year in Israel should be viewed as a capstone of a 12-year journey of Jewish education,” the study concluded.

Change differed between boys and girls, with girls reporting higher religious scores and basing their changes on generally being in Israel, while boys reported their changes stemming from learning. Prayer was also a perceived effector with students reporting its affect as a change agent on par with their teachers. Girls also reported speaking to their parents and friends on average twice as much as boys did.

Only 25 percent of the 600 students said they had a dramatic change in their religious values in their year in Israel. While Eisenberg stressed that the findings were correlational and not causational, of that 25 percent, most students reported coming from families with stronger conflict and less cohesion than students who experienced less changes. “A home that provides a consistent religious and moral message is more likely to produce children who internalize these messages,” said the study.

Dr. Samuel Heilman, the Harold Proshansky Chair in Jewish Studies at the Graduate Center and the author of “Sliding to the Right,” said he was not familiar with this study, but noted that the lack of change among students underlined a larger shift inside Orthodoxy.

“Much of the change created has already been assimilated by the [high school] institutions,” Heilman said. “Over the last 20 years these [Israeli] institutions have had a clear impact; they have had an impact on orthodoxy and in moving orthodoxy to the right.”

Eisenberg believes that the “flipping out” concept is produced more from appearance than anything else.

“It’s the vividness factor,” he said. “It’s why people are more afraid to go on a plane after a plane crash, even though flying is much safer than driving. When someone dresses a certain way, you think they’ve changed. Deep down the changes aren’t so different, but that’s what catches your attention.”

The Pelcovitz-Eisenberg study plans a third phase to follow up on the students after a year in college.

As for his own year in Israel, Eisenberg was quick to report, it was “transformative.”