THE MOST interesting detail to emerge from a couple of big surveys this week was not the information we learned: that over-50s are generally happy, or that they may have significantly contributed to the property boom.
No, the most interesting thing is that two surveys came along within a couple of days and both had this significant caveat: people clearly lied.
Okay, so it’s a bit strong to say that everyone lied. Most were misleading themselves when saying that, yes, their health is actually quite good or, no, they are not overweight. But the extent of the denial was bracing, and the results say a lot not only about individuals but also about society – and how a great many surveys, including the census, can’t be trusted.
Eighty per cent of over-50s told Tilda, the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing, that they were in “excellent, very good or good” health – yet three-quarters of that age group is overweight or obese, and high blood pressure affects a third of them up to the age of 64 and rises thereafter. Eight thousand people were questioned for this study, so it’s no statistical flash in the chip pan.
Meanwhile, a survey for SafeFood told us that 38 per cent of respondents consider themselves overweight, when in fact two-thirds of Irish form the majority now puffing the streets. You can bet that a great many people looked at the subsequent publicity pictures of a man with a 37in waist and a woman with a 32in waist – the threshold beyond which lies fattiness – and thought they could do with a good feeding.
Safefood claims we’re a society that no longer sees obesity unless it sidles up to us and pinches our food; that we percieve new norms for weight when in fact they are the same as they always were.
People concerned with showing themselves to be healthier and better behaved than they actually are is not new, and not particular to Ireland. “Social desirability” is the scourge of well-meaning researchers the world over. Because of it people often say that they smoke less than they do, drink less, buy less, gamble less, are less bigoted and more law abiding and that they generally comport themselves in a manner at odds with actuality.
There are differences depending on culture. More collective societies – in particular those of Japan, Korea and other Asian countries – are keen to maintain a good impression to an outsider regardless of the reality. Consumerist, more individual countries – the West, pretty much – are less likely to engage in such face-saving but instead indulge in self-enhancement, such as exagerating social skills or past performances. The self-belief, it must be said, is often sincere. (By the way, people often give innacurate information about their kids, too, in contradiction of the fact that obesity has grown among children. Many also lie about their pets’ weight, for what that’s worth.)
Ireland, perhaps, sits somewhere between the two models: a strong community offers a measure of collectivism and desire to save face, yet we are also a western consumerist society. Wherever it sits, though, once you start seeing the possibility of distortion in one Irish survey, it becomes apparent in others.
For instance, look past the straightforward, definitive information on the census – age, address, family size and so on – and you get into the subjective responses. “How is your health in general?” That final result may be largely a measure of our self-deception.
Or how much can we trust the question on the Irish language? Irish has become so socially fashionable in recent years that people must be tempted to exaggerate the amount they actually speak. (I’ll put my hand up here and say that this time around I admitted I speak less Irish than I said I did in 2006. I’m going to take a flyer and suggest I wasn’t alone in my féin-deception.)
All of this further highlights the repeated surveys that say the Irish are among the happiest in the world – although the statistical consistency over many years would suggest that we’re either great liars or that there is a truth to it. But this week’s surveys deserve attention and concern, because it’s easier to measure waistline than a mood. They give a sense of what it’s like to work as a GP or nurse in a clinic busy with people who need persuading that, yes, they are actually overweight and, no, they are not as fit as they think and, yes, they could become another heart-disease statistic to help keep it top of our list of killers.
And they confirm that, when 6 per cent of Ireland’s healthcare costs are spent on obesity, and indirect costs are in the region of €500 million, truth is not the only expense.
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