Misery loves company, suicide study shows

The happiest places have the highest suicide rates, sometimes according to a fascinating new US study.

Researchers, the study of how people varies decided feeling of well-being from place to place, compare their results with suicide rates.

"Unhappy people in a happy place can feel particularly hard treated by life," suggested Andrew Oswald of the University of Warwick in England.A man goes past storefront shutters painted by street artists Ben one in the East end of London. Life around people who are quite satisfied with their lives, make if you are not more misery, researchers say you feel. Andrew winning/Reuters

Or, in other words by co-author Stephen Wu from Hamilton College in Clinton, New York, surrounded by unfortunate people can not feel so bad for themselves.

But Wu urged caution in conclusions, saying: "I don't think that means if you are unhappy should it to others who are dissatisfied."

Their study as the number 1 ranked Utah the United State for residents sense of well-being, but it has also received a high no.9 in suicide rate. On the other hand, State New York arranged a low 45th in well-being, but a still lower 50th in suicides.

The researchers came up with their rankings of an American survey, the behavioral risk factors and U.S. Census Bureau numbers on suicide rates.

Sonja Lyubomirsky, was a Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Riverside, not involved in the study, agreed that life around people who are, on average, quite satisfied, if you are not, feel life more misery with her can.

In an interview by e-Mail said she, that remind you of an effect results, discussed by researchers in cases where a city has a high suicide rate with the reputation of being a good place to live.

The idea is "If you connect unhappy there, 'something must really with me wrong' or" nothing will make me happy "So you are more likely to get depressed and have of the life," said Lyubomirsky, who is researching happiness and prosperity.

However, she added, can be other things in the game.

She suggested that you can it have in common other factors, the countries with high life satisfaction, which could be associated with high rates of suicide. For example, if they are more rural, could that mean that people are even more isolated. She said religious beliefs, which may also concern itself between the States.

John F. Helliwell, from the University of British Columbia, has studied welfare and suicide rates international, said suicides tend, reached its climax when days are longer, "not as you might have thought, when days are shortest." Researchers believe if people, who are dissatisfied in happy, see social situations such as picnics, bring the own crisis to a head.

The new study, which was accepted for publication in the journal of economic behavior & organization saw the 50 U.S. States and Washington, D.C.

There are the top 10 States for welfare as Utah, Colorado, Louisiana, Minnesota, Wyoming, Hawaii, Arizona, Delaware, Florida, and Nevada.

Four of these States are also in the top 10 for suicide rates, with Nevada to Wyoming, 3rd, 5th; Colorado, 6th; and Utah, 9. Arizona was 11th and Florida, 15.

The 10 States with are the lowest probably reviews: Kentucky, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Missouri, Ohio, New York, Massachusetts, Michigan and Rhode Iceland.

Only one of these States, West Virginia, is among the top 10 for suicides, ranking No. 8. Only other State in the top 20 was Kentucky on November 16.

Wu said that international studies found that Scandinavian high satisfaction and high suicide rates display countries.

But the researchers say that because of the variations of culture and suicide reporting systems, it is difficult to make comparisons from one country to another.

To develop their data, Wu and colleagues uses information collected to identify by the Federal Government in the behavioural surveillance system, a monthly survey of the health data collect risk factor and emerging problems. A survey question asking people how satisfied they are with their lives and the responses to people aged 18 to 85 formed the basis for the review well being.

The survey interview with more than 350,000 people each year. The suicide rankings are based on mortality data reported by the Census Bureau in 2008.

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