Football as a uniting force, by Professor Mark Griffiths

Last week, I was interviewed by BBC News Online about ‘the rise of the instant expert’, and how people who may not normally follow football suddenly have lots to say about the World Cup. Clearly, football is not a subject you need to have any academic qualifications to talk about, so it’s easy to be an expert – or at least appear to be one. In addition to this, the World Cup gives all of us a chance to get behind the national team and express our patriotism. In short, it’s a powerful unifying event both socially and psychologically.

Dr Alan Pringle from the University of Nottingham has carried out a lot of research on the positive benefits of watching football. He reports that watching football together strengthens bonds between family members, particularly between fathers and sons. He has written that many parents see football as an important part of their relationship with their children. Dr Pringle argues that watching football together as a family generates conversation and provides an opportunity for parents to spend ‘quality time’ with their children. Pringle goes as far to say that this quality time spent with parents during childhood often continues long after children have grown up and so allows a way of maintaining parent child relationships throughout life. Like me, Dr Pringle believes football can provide a platform to communicate with others, have a good gossip (which is known to facilitate mental well-being), exchange views, and bond through either winning or losing. Football is also a good social leveller that allows culturally diverse people to relate with one another (Source: Journal of the Royal Society of Health, 2004).

American psychologists at the University of Kansas carried out three studies showing that when your team does well, it can result in feelings of happiness, wellbeing, and collective euphoria. Their research showed that through association with a team’s success, fans ‘bask in reflected glory’ (BIRG). They speculated that BIRG-ing improves mood in both individuals and communities. They also argued that strong identification with a specific sports team provides a buffer from feelings of depression and alienation, and at the same time, fosters feelings of belongingness and self-worth. They also showed that under some circumstances, negativity can be a positive unifying force. For instance, sometimes fans may feel a sense of pessimism prior to a match.  However, the possibility that it can all go wrong for the team can be a uniting factor. In such cases, the researchers argued that a refusal to believe that things might go well may protect against disappointment as a result of failure. This is referred to as ‘cutting off reflected failure’ (CORF, as opposed to BIRG). Another way of forming a united bond is the ‘shared moaning’ after a defeat or poor performance (Source: Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 1991).

In another study, two Scottish medics reported that the World Cup has a positive effect on mental health – at least in the short-term. They found that around the time of the World Cup tournament, there was a significant reduction in numbers of emergency psychiatric admissions during and after the World Cup finals in both men and women. The study reported an increase in the numbers of schizophrenic and neurotic men accessing medical services before the World Cup. They speculated that these findings may be due to the enhancement of national identity and cohesion (Source: British Journal of Psychiatry, 1990).

Professor Mark Griffiths, psychologist, Nottingham Trent University

To speak to Mark, call the University Press Office directly on 0115 848 8785 or email worldcup@ntu.ac.uk

[To view Nottingham Trent University’s team of World Cup experts go to www.ntu.ac.uk/worldcup]

Letting it all out: Football, catharticism and good mental health, by Professor Mark Griffiths

Most of the academic research carried out football supporters tends to be about the more salacious and negative aspects such as football racism hooliganism. However, over the last few years there has been an increasing amount of research examining the more positive aspects of watching football in the development of good emotional health and psychological wellbeing. In one of my earlier blogs I briefly examined the role of emotion and the more negative consequences of being a passionate football supporter. However, there are some really interesting studies showing how the watching of football and supporting a team can play a role in the development of positive mental health. So could watching England play in the World Cup lead to positive mental health outcomes? In the words of the Camelot advert, maybe, just maybe!

Dr Alan Pringle, a lecturer in the School of Nursing at the University of Nottingham carried out some interesting research on Mansfield Town supporters. More specifically in a paper published in the Journal of The Royal Society for the Promotion of Health, he examined the perceived benefits of supporting Mansfield Town and the role of football as a cathartic and stress relieving experience. In his research, Pringle asked Mansfield fans to keep ‘match diaries’ and for them to write down their emotional experiences and behaviour before, during and after watching Mansfield Town. Once fans had written their match diaries he also interviewed the supporters taking part in his study. Perhaps not surprisingly, one of the major findings that Dr Pringle reported was that supporting a football team provides ‘a sense of belonging’. All of us watching England during the World Cup will no doubt experience this sense of belonging, a shared sense of national pride, and the dream of wanting to see England reach and win the final. I can certainly remember how I – and the rest of the nation – felt the day after David Beckham’s penalty helped England beat Argentina in the 2002 World Cup.

Pringle also reported that fans said that watching football led to a cathartic release of tension for the supporters – “an emotional cleansing”. In the strictest sense, cathartic actions relate to a purging of the bowels. In a psychological sense, cathartic actions have come to mean the purging of individual stress and tension. Watching a football match provides a special type of environment and experience in which people often engage in politically incorrect actions and do things that they wouldn’t necessarily do in other normal day-to-day events (such as shout, swear, make obscene gestures, etc. at other people such as the referee and/or opposing fans). Scientifically, it’s been very hard to prove that cathartic (aggressive) outbursts reduce overall aggression, but in this instance at least, football supporters claim the vocal outpourings for their team are psychologically helpful and that they felt much better for it. Pringle goes as far as to say that the opportunity for football supporters to discharge emotion and externalise tension is an important component in maintaining health.

So next time you are screaming at the television at a World Cup referee who can’t hear you, console yourself with the fact that you might be doing yourself some good – psychologically at least.

Professor Mark Griffiths, psychologist, Nottingham Trent University

To speak to Mark, call the University Press Office directly on 0115 848 8785 or email worldcup@ntu.ac.uk

[To view Nottingham Trent University’s team of World Cup experts go to www.ntu.ac.uk/worldcup]