“ Euphoria ” or “ Only Teardrops ”? Eurovision Song Contest performance, life satisfaction and suicide

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Abstract

Background

The popularity of the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) in Europe has been high for decades. We aimed to assess whether a country’s performance in the ESC is associated with life satisfaction and suicide mortality in European countries.

Methods

We analysed nationally representative Eurobarometer survey data on life satisfaction from 33 European countries ( N = 162,773) and country-level standardised suicide mortality data for years 2009 to 2015. The associations of winning the Contest, performing terribly, and higher final ranking with life satisfaction and suicide rates were all assessed.

Results

Winning the ESC was not statistically significantly associated with increased life satisfaction or suicide rates, although every ten-place increase in final ranking was associated with an increase in life satisfaction (adjusted odds ratios [aOR] 1.04; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.02 to 1.05) and a decrease in suicide mortality rates (β = − 0.30; 95% CI: -0.59 to − 0.01). Terrible performance was associated with greater life satisfaction compared to not competing at all (aOR 1.13; 95%CI: 1.07 to 1.20).

Conclusion

The good news for participating countries is that just competing at the ESC is associated with higher life satisfaction among the population. As improved performance is linked to Ooh Aah Just a Little Bit of improved life satisfaction, further research into how such international competitions may impact public health is needed.

Related collections

Most cited references 16

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The authors investigated the role of self-reported life satisfaction in mortality with a prospective cohort study (1976-1995). A nationwide sample of healthy adults (18-64 years, n = 22,461) from the Finnish Twin Cohort responded to a questionnaire about life satisfaction and known predictors of mortality in 1975. A summary score for life satisfaction (LS), defined as interest in life, happiness, loneliness, and general ease of living (scale range, 4-20), was determined and used as a three-category variable: the satisfied (LS, 4-6) (21%), the intermediate group (LS, 7-11) (65%), and the dissatisfied (LS, 12-20) (14%). Mortality data were analyzed with Cox regression. Dissatisfaction was linearly associated with increased mortality. The age-adjusted hazard ratios of all-cause, disease, or injury mortality among dissatisfied versus satisfied men were 2.11 (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.68, 2.64), 1.83 (95% CI: 1.40, 2.39), and 3.01 (95% CI: 1.94, 4.69), respectively. Adjusting for marital status, social class, smoking, alcohol use, and physical activity diminished these risks to 1.49 (95% CI: 1.16, 1.92), 1.35 (95% CI: 1.01, 1.82), and 1.93 (95% CI: 1.19, 3.12), respectively. Dissatisfaction was associated with increased disease mortality, particularly in men with heavy alcohol use (hazard ratio = 3.76, 95% CI: 1.61, 8.80). Women did not show similar associations between life satisfaction and mortality. Life dissatisfaction may predict mortality and serve as a general health risk indicator. This effect seems to be partially mediated through adverse health behavior.

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The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) World Cup, held in Germany from June 9 to July 9, 2006, provided an opportunity to examine the relation between emotional stress and the incidence of cardiovascular events. Cardiovascular events occurring in patients in the greater Munich area were prospectively assessed by emergency physicians during the World Cup. We compared those events with events that occurred during the control period: May 1 to June 8 and July 10 to July 31, 2006, and May 1 to July 31 in 2003 and 2005. Acute cardiovascular events were assessed in 4279 patients. On days of matches involving the German team, the incidence of cardiac emergencies was 2.66 times that during the control period (95% confidence interval [CI], 2.33 to 3.04; P<0.001); for men, the incidence was 3.26 times that during the control period (95% CI, 2.78 to 3.84; P<0.001), and for women, it was 1.82 times that during the control period (95% CI, 1.44 to 2.31; P<0.001). Among patients with coronary events on days when the German team played, the proportion with known coronary heart disease was 47.0%, as compared with 29.1% of patients with events during the control period. On those days, the highest average incidence of events was observed during the first 2 hours after the beginning of each match. A subanalysis of serious events during that period, as compared with the control period, showed an increase in the incidence of myocardial infarction with ST-segment elevation by a factor of 2.49 (95% CI, 1.47 to 4.23), of myocardial infarction without ST-segment elevation or unstable angina by a factor of 2.61 (95% CI, 2.22 to 3.08), and of cardiac arrhythmia causing major symptoms by a factor of 3.07 (95% CI, 2.32 to 4.06) (P<0.001 for all comparisons). Viewing a stressful soccer match more than doubles the risk of an acute cardiovascular event. In view of this excess risk, particularly in men with known coronary heart disease, preventive measures are urgently needed. Copyright 2008 Massachusetts Medical Society.

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Life satisfaction and mental health problems (18 to 35 years).

D M Fergusson, G McLeod, L Horwood … (2015)

Previous research has found that mental health is strongly associated with life satisfaction. In this study we examine associations between mental health problems and life satisfaction in a birth cohort studied from 18 to 35 years.

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Author and article information

Contributors

Filippos T. Filippidis:

ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2101-2559

+44 (0)20 7594 7142 , f.filippidis@imperial.ac.uk

Anthony A. Laverty: a.laverty@imperial.ac.uk

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): BMC Public Health

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): BMC Public Health

Title: BMC Public Health

Publisher: BioMed Central (London )

ISSN (Electronic): 1471-2458

Publication date (Electronic): 11 May 2018

Publication date PMC-release: 11 May 2018

Publication date Collection: 2018

Volume: 18

Electronic Location Identifier: 582

Affiliations

[1 ]ISNI 0000 0001 2113 8111, GRID grid.7445.2, Department of Primary Care and Public Health, School of Public Health, , Imperial College London, ; 310 Reynolds Building, St. Dunstan’s Road, London, W6 8RP UK

[2 ]ISNI 0000 0001 2113 8111, GRID grid.7445.2, Public Health Policy Evaluation Unit, School of Public Health, , Imperial College London, ; 310 Reynolds Building, St. Dunstan’s Road, London, W6 8RP UK

Author information

Filippos T. Filippidis http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2101-2559

Article

Publisher ID: 5497

DOI: 10.1186/s12889-018-5497-3

PMC ID: 5946539

PubMed ID: 29747607

SO-VID: b8772c71-6f35-4efa-9ece-b3c881c4338d

License:

Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver ( http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.

History

Date received : 19 February 2018

Date accepted : 23 April 2018

Custom metadata

ScienceOpen disciplines: Public health

Data availability:

ScienceOpen disciplines: Public health

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