Healthline: Why Rooting for Your Favorite Team May be Boosting Your Mental Health Too

“To understand how fandom helps with loneliness, Valenta said to think about a Fan Flywheel, which is a positive feedback loop where there are two variables: X and Y. X influences Y, and Y then, in turn, influences X, which creates a positive feedback loop that sustains momentum and creates energy.

“Essentially, you lean into your fandom, you participate in fan activities, you engage as a fan; that’s the X in this example. And that creates the positive feedback of social interactions, the Y variable, which incentivizes you to lean into more fan activities, more fan engagement, which only then begets more social interaction,” Valenta told Healthline. “Once it starts to spin, it takes over.”

The book’s findings suggest that sports fandom may create greater belonging in one’s life. “And it might not come right away, but as you participate in your fantasy football leagues, and you go to games with your friends, and you invite the family over for the game, etc., you will begin to experience more belonging in your life,” he said.

Other key findings they discovered include:

• The more engaged the sports fan, the stronger their family ties

• Fans report higher satisfaction with their careers and relationships

• Fans are more likely to vote and exhibit greater trust in cultural institutions

• Fans are more likely to report feelings of happiness and gratitude

• Fandom increases identity complexity and broadens perspectives"

Some Insights From This Article

• As the world cup approaches the knockout stages, many of us are perhaps rooting for our favorite team/player on the grand stage. According to this article rooting for our favorite teams and players in sports can improve our mental health! This comes from the amount of emotions that can come from a match and the social interaction that comes from interacting with the fanbase online and in-person for watch parties.

• Also one of the most common factors that can deepen ties and relationships with one another is the avenue of sports. Finding out someone has the same fandom for a sports team/player as you makes relating and talking with that person that much easier!

• The article also found that this benefit isn’t limited to just sports teams alone, other communities and fan bases including video games, TV shows/movies and other sorts of “fandoms” bring this beneficial social interaction as well.

Are you part of a fandom?

Full article is here!

#Sports #WorldCup #Social