Self-Confident?

June 18th, 2022| Topic: RaMbLeS | 0

Of course, there’s something to be said for being confident, having a positive mindset, convictions, certainty, and all that.

But for one’s own health? Maybe not. For that humility, it appears, is better. So claimeth researchers from the Hertie School (ouch! that hurts!) in Berlin and University of Vienna in The Journal of Economics in Ageing: ”Health Misperception and Healthcare Utilisation among Older Europeans.”

They looked at data from over 80,000 Europeans aged 50 and older, from data collected as part of the the SHARE (Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe) study between 2006-2013. Subjects were asked to evaluate their own health. For example, they were asked if they have trouble getting up from chairs after sitting for long periods. Next, participants were asked to physically get up from a chair as a test. These questions and tests were to ascertain if each individual had been overestimating, underestimating, or correctly assessing their health. Additional memory and mobility related misjudgments were also considered by researchers.

The scientists declared:

We find a strong and significant association between health misperception and healthcare utilisation.”

Most people, they found, correctly assessed their health (79 percent), with another 11 percent overestimating and 10 percent underestimating.

It was found that those who overestimate their abilities often earned more money and are more likely to be leaders; but these folks also tended to take more risks, have more accidents, drink more alcohol, eat less healthily, and sleep less sufficiently.

And, these older ones who are over-confident about their health apparently don’t go to their doctors as often as they should. And people who are not confident about their health tend to visit their doctors more often. (And that included dental visits, too.) They sought their healthcare providers 17 percent less often than others (who weren’t that self-confident). And those who underestimate their health visited the doctor 21 percent more frequently.

[Incidentally, no such relationship was seen for hospital visits, probably because hospital visits are more regulated and serious, tending have the same frequency for those over-confident and those less so.]

See, humility is a good thing. Particularly humility before God, “fear of God.”

The reward of humility, the fear of Yahweh
are riches, honor and life.
Proverbs 22:4

The fear of Yahweh is the instruction for wisdom,
and before honor is humility.
Proverbs 15:33

But also humility before others.

[Do] nothing from selfishness or according to empty glory,
but with humility regard one another as more important than yourselves;
do not look out [only] for your own personal interests,
but also for the interests of others.
Philippians 2:3

That kind of an attitude is a mark of Christlikeness:

Let this attitude be in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus,
who, although He existed in the form of God,
did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped,
but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant,
and being made in the likeness of men.
Being found in appearance as a man,
He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death,
even death on a cross.
For this reason, God also highly exalted Him,
and bestowed on Him the name that is above every name,
so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow—
of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth—
and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
Philippians 2:5–11

Be humble. Glorify God. Visit your doctor. Live long.

SOURCE:
Study Finds; The Journal of Economics in Ageing