When I asked study author Rachel Stein at West Virginia University why she excluded Pennsylvania, she provided a surprising answer. She indicated she and her colleagues chose Ohio because it had a disproportionately high number of Amish and Mennonite obituaries compared to Pennsylvania and other states. According to Stein, Ohio is “home to approximately 23% of the US Amish population, but contributing 56% of the total obituaries published” and “Pennsylvania was not represented to the same degree as Ohio in the data.” Incredibly, this seems to mean that when they saw evidence of a more positive
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