Bulgaria - Haiti Observer Blog

Listed on the 2012 count of those countries leading the world in 'suffering' is the western hemisphere's poorest, Haiti. It is a position resulting from years of government instability and fighting and was exacerbated by the devastating effects of the earthquake that tumbled hopes and dreams along with lives and infrastructure in January of 2010.

Still, as the list goes, it is headed by countries on the other side of the world, Bulgaria and Armenia respectively. The statistics are that Bulgarians, a large percentage of 39, rated their lives to be so bleak they could be labeled as 'suffering. This percentage outstripped the second most economically distressed country, Armenia, which has 37% of its population acknowledging their poor condition of life.

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The Caribbean Islands, once you see one you see them all

A field research study on the subject of optimism has been conducted, and the results written up in the current issue of the Journal of Personality publication. Undertaken by Boston University social-science researchers, the study project correlated emotional, mental, and physical states in relation to levels of optimism or pessimism in study subjects' attitudes towards life.

Researchers interviewed 150,000 people living in 140 nations. The Caribbean nation of Haiti ranked third as the most pessimistic place in the world, behind Zimbabwe and Egypt at numbers one and two. Two characteristics were discovered that play a significant role on the rates of pessimism found in Africa and the Caribbean, those of poverty and illiteracy.

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