How World Cup joy for Scotland can make us a happier healthier nation

We live in a world and country which can feel increasingly polarised. Indy2 or Better Together? The Saltire as a symbol of civic nationalism or a threat to immigrant communities? Rangers or Celtic (or better yet, Dundee United)?

Yet occasionally something happens which creates an experience which reveals the strength of our shared identity. By qualifying for our first men’s World Cup for 27 years, the achievement wasn’t just celebrated by the hardcore Tartan Army, but by the whole country.

While I danced around my living room with my Scottish dad and kids, my Irish wife joined in. Strangers smiled at each other on my Wednesday dog walk and swapped the usual “it’s cold enough today” banality for “did you see the game?!”

My Indian colleague, who doesn’t watch football, excitedly brought up the match in our morning meeting. The whole country watched, or at least was aware of, Scotland’s collective triumph.

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As social and organisational psychologists, my colleagues and I have often speculated about what it must feel like to win the World Cup. How would strangers interact with one another? Would some groups be excluded? How long would the excitement last? Would there be impacts on national identification and even health?

We depressingly gave up on the prospect of studying these questions in Scotland and turned instead to studying New Zealand during the Rugby World Cup in 2015. Following their victory, we found evidence of increased social connection between New Zealanders, collective joy from the shared nature of the experience, and people even felt that their physical and mental health had improved.

The results showed the ability of international sport to bring people together and provided further evidence for the idea of ‘Social Cure’, such that our shared group memberships can be as important predictors of our health as diet, exercise and smoking. Whether the health benefits of Tuesday offset the impact of the consequent alcohol consumption remain to be seen.

Scotland may not have won the World Cup on Tuesday, but it sure felt like it. The experience of the match and the euphoria afterwards reveal important things about who we are.

Our self-definitions are made up of multiple identities, all of which are collective. I’m part of a family, a community, various friendship groups, a profession and a nation. I identify with these groups, and a sense of sharing these identities with other people, including strangers, leads to connection, intimacy and shared emotion.

Emotion is sometimes seen as irrational, but it tells us something meaningful about who we are. We get emotional about Scotland winning because the team’s victory is a victory for all those who identify as Scottish.

Group success – the technical term is self-realisation – was particularly felt in this case because we’re usually the nation whose hearts are broken in injury time and our goalies lobbed from the halfway line. To quote Trainspotting’s Renton “it’s shite being Scottish”.

No wonder then that overcoming the tag of glorious failures in such a spectacular manner led to tears and stranger-hugging.

Scottishness wasn’t the only relevant social identity. Football is woven into the identities and histories of our nation, but also our families. After the final whistle blew and people had time to catch their breath, many wept a tear for an absent grandfather no longer around to share the moment, or for a young daughter who will get to experience a Scottish World Cup for the first time.

Football is meaningful because it’s connected to the social identities and communities which make up who we are. This was never clearer than when we lost the collectivity of football during the Covid pandemic, and the game was reduced to some blokes kicking a ball about an echoey stadium.

The absence of crowds stripped it of meaning and left fans secretly wondering “is this it?”. There were no strangers to embrace, and if there were, it would have been illegal.

While Tuesday’s goals were spectacular, it was the shared reaction to them - in the stands, pubs and living rooms - which made it so special.

Surprisingly, the idea that groups can give pleasure – and even be good for you – is a radical one within social and organisational psychology. Glance inside most textbooks, and group behaviour equals irrationality, discrimination, manipulation or conflict.

It’s time that the notion of collectivity was rehabilitated. We’re a social species who define who we are by the groups we belong to. These things matter and give us meaning and purpose.

The science says that shared identity and collective experiences are good for us. So, at a time of division, savour a shared moment of joy. Let’s make the World Cup as collective and inclusive as possible to express who we are, bring us closer together, and perhaps even make us healthier.

- Dr Fergus Neville is a senior lecturer in organisational studies at the University of St Andrews Business School.