Regardless of what one does in life- whether it’s work (nature of vocation), social status (standing in the society), financial standing, level of success- the one thing, as they say, that’s really important is the level of satisfaction.
Is it not?
In an age where one increasingly finds more impetus being given to gadgets and virtual communication, this being an age of instant gratification, the love for larger perspectives and simple pleasures of life is finding itself cornered, if not utterly redundant.
There’s an increased sense of shallowness and insularity that has gone onto to define our generation.
A lack of clarity or purpose, it’s been found, are the fertile breeding grounds for facets like discontent, tempestuous relationships, and a sense of indifference that form a dominant feature of our lives.
In that sense it’s not that hard to swallow a bitter pill; that different countries are coping with a common issue. And that’s related to a lower level of life satisfaction.
Of course, what hurts most is that the general level of life satisfaction around the world points to a worrying picture, especially when one talks of countries like an Ireland.
That being said, what really happened at Ireland? Why the level of life satisfaction in Ireland points to a tricky current picture?
According to a recent study conducted by the World Health Organization, famously known as the WHO, different age-groups of youngsters in the age groups of 11, 13, 15 were covered for responses.
The said study was carried out in as many as 44 different countries from Europe and Canada with the general aim being to arrive at an understanding of the life satisfaction among the younger age-groups.
The results, lest it is ignored, didn’t really point to a pretty picture. Here’s what was the most worrying revelation from the massive WHO study:
Apparently, it is the Irish youngsters who happen to be the least satisfied in life. This is when they were compared to counterparts from 45 other countries.
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There were different factors that were considered in order to arrive at a broader understanding of the study, such as parameters that even dealt with alcohol consumption.
In the case of Ireland, the 13-year-olds, it was found, were least likely to say that they had previously tried alcohol. However, the nations that topped this part of the global study included Greece, followed by France, and England, in that order.
That being said, there were other important perspectives too!
The Irish Times had the following to add on the important matter:
Irish teens and tweens were also among the least likely to state they had smoked tobacco before – 11-year-olds were third from the bottom out of 42 other countries, 13-year-olds were fifth from the bottom, and 15-year-olds were eight from the bottom of the table.
The Irish component of the study, published on Tuesday, was led by Professor Saoirse Nic Gabhainn in NUI Galway’s Health Promotion Research Centre.
But there was more.
Ireland ranked in the middle of the table when it came to 15-year-olds who had smoked cannabis before, with Bulgaria at the top.