The friendship and community shared in pubs can boost wellbeing (pic courtesy of dan/freedigitalphotos.net)
If you’ve got a local community pub that you visit regularly for a social pint, you’re more likely to be happier and more trusting than people who don’t have a local. That’s according to research from the University of Oxford (carried out for Camra, the Campaign for Real Ale). While Camra – understandably – would promote research saying pubs are good for you, the findings of the study focus less on drinking beer and more on the emotional and mental wellbeing of people who often pop down their local.
The study was carried out by Oxford University Professor Robin Dunbar, an evolutionary psychologist known for his research into the limit on the number of friends any one person can have (it’s 150, in case you were wondering).
His report, Friends on Tap, says that the more friends you have and the more often you see them, the happier and healthier you’ll be. If you have a local pub and visit it regularly, you’re likely to have a better community network, and feel happier and more fulfilled with your life than, say, someone who might visit a larger pub now and again and who doesn’t know that many people there. People in city centre bars are said to have shorter conversations and feel less engaged with the people they’re out with. The research talks about social drinking, not people who regularly consume vast quantities of alcohol.
Professor Robin Dunbar said: “Friendship and community are probably the two most important factors influencing our health and wellbeing. Making and maintaining friendships, however, is something that has to be done face-to-face: the digital world is simply no substitute. Given the increasing tendency for our social life to be online rather than face-to-face, having relaxed accessible venues where people can meet old friends and make new ones becomes ever more necessary.”
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