The events of recent years are evidence of an increase in inter-ethnic and inter-confessional tension, which led to the actualization of the problems of religion, confessions in general and, in particular, religious identity.

This article presents some results of an applied study of the religious identity of Kazakhstani students, conducted with the help of the Questionnaire "Components of Religious Identity" adapted by V.A. Shorokhova. The study showed that the structure of religious identity is determined by cross-cultural and confessional features. Thus, for Muslim students, it has a pronounced social orientation and is more focused on ways of social interaction and individual positive changes. Students who profess Orthodoxy, who view religion as a way of developing individual positive changes, are dominated by an internal experience of religious identity. This gave us the opportunity to classify Muslim students as representatives of a highly collectivist culture, and to consider students who preach Orthodoxy as gravitating towards an individualistic culture.