Rude Island

Continuing our dip into the murky waters of scholarly research, today's entry takes a look at a third way in which a British study has determined that Little Rhody lives on the dark side of mood and personality. Rhode Island ranks 45th in the category of "agreeableness," a personality type defined by people who are "warm, friendly and compassionate."

Only six places ranked lower: Maine (Yankee cold), New York (Yankee fans), Nevada (Vegas vice), Wyoming (Cheney country), Washington, D.C. (lawyers, guns and money) and Alaska (moose for breakfast again). According to the report:

Friendliness, trust and helpfulness are the dominant characteristics of a strong A rating. Social activities that promote tight social relations, such as spending time with friends and entertaining guests at home, are popular. People are more likely to be religious and attend places of worship. Deaths due to cancer and heart disease are lower than many other states. The warm, friendly and altruistic attitude of agreeable people apparently contributes to an environment characterized by social, psychological and physical health.

Yup, that's not us. So where would one find the most agreeable Americans? The survey says...North Dakota.

Rogue nature

Yesterday we noted how a British-based study determined that Rhode Island was the second-most “stressed-out” state in the U.S. Today our weeklong blog series on the report takes a look at a second category, “conscientiousness,” ranking states according to the personality traits of being “dutiful, responsible and self-disciplined.” Here, Rhode Island came in 48th, meaning only three states finished with lower scores (the District of Columbia is included in the personality map). A description of the cultural profile for states that rank high on the conscientiousness scale follows:

Individuals in these states are more likely to place importance on religion and attend places of worship. Exercising at home is popular, but life expectancy is relatively low. Entertaining and socializing with friends is less popular than in many other states. Computer scientists and mathematicians are more likely to flourish than artists and entertainers. Many people prefer systematic and focused tasks, and clearly defined rules and regulations.

If you read yesterday’s blog on “neuroticism,” you’ll note the inconsistencies. Let’s start with the premise of the conscientiousness category. If it’s true, then “entertaining and socializing with friends” would be more popular and “artists and entertainers” would be more likely to flourish in low-scoring states like Rhode Island. Except that those findings contradict yesterday’s note suggesting a high neuroticism ranking means that “people are less likely to go out or spend time with friends” and “entertainment and the arts tend not to flourish in these states.”

But a closer reading of the report reveals something else. The three states that finished lower than Rhody in the conscientiousness category were Hawaii, Maine and Alaska. Note the similarities: All are ocean states. All are iconoclastic, with strong separatist traditions and uniquely individualistic and independent state cultures. Historically, all have experienced some dislocation with mainstream America. (Maine actually split off from Massachusetts; Rhode Island was the first colony to renounce British rule and the last of the original 13 to accept American statehood; Hawaii and Alaska, the most recent states to join the club, are remote and exotic places that still prefer the totemic to the bureaucratic.) All have been havens for dissenters, free-thinkers, pirates, rogues and scandal-mongers. These are places where individual liberties are celebrated (in ways both good and bad), where “systematic and focused tasks” are considered dull and dreary and “clearly defined rules and regulations” are to be avoided whenever possible. There’s a reason we’re called The Independent State (with the highest number of registered independent voters per capita in the U.S.) But if you’re looking for more conscientiousness in your life, take a trip to New Mexico, the top-ranked state in the category.

Stress Test: Grade F

A study from the University of Cambridge in the U.K. has identified Rhode Island as one of the most "stressed-out" states in the U.S. Titled "The Geography of Personality," the study attempts to determine how the personalities of Americans often differ according to the state in which they live. Rhode Islanders ranked second in the category of "neuroticism," described in the findings as "a personality trait normally associated with high levels of stress, anxiety and impulsive behavior." Here's the cultural profile, according to the report:

The impact of neuroticism is particularly strong in relation to public health. Exercise is less popular and life-expectancy lower. There is a comparatively high mortality rate due to heart disease and cancer. In states with a high-level neuroticism rating, people are less likely to go out or spend time with friends. Entertainment and the arts tend not to flourish in these states.

Strange. Those last two sentences don't seem to fit a state that is half-beach, half-bar, and crawling with artists. A place where everybody knows everybody, and anybody, even a nobody, can be somebody. (We've said it before and we'll say it again: If Kevin Bacon were a Rhode Islander, he'd only need two degrees of separation.) It has also been widely reported that there are more artists per capita in Rhode Island than any other state. (Then again, perhaps that confirms the findings. Nobody actually buys art here. If a majority of those polled were starving artists, it would explain the pessimism.)

Maybe it's a size thing. Research showed that the most stressed-out state is West Virginia. On the other hand, if you're looking for Zen and the Art of Stress-Free, Life Cycle Maintenance, the British scholars offer a simple solution: Move to Utah.

Rhody bling

In today’s Monday Morning Quarterback column for si.com, Peter King wrote that “Super Bowl rings have gotten as big as Rhode Island.” Oddly enough, for years Providence was the bling capital of the world, a city as synonymous with making costume jewelry in America as Detroit was for manufacturing cars. King’s timing, however, was brutal. The day after New England Patriots’ QB Tom Brady went down with a season-ending knee injury in the first quarter of the first game of the year, King may as well have written that New England sports fans are suffering from a state of depression as big as Rhode Island. Just 35 seconds away from taking home the hardware during the last Super Bowl, the Pats were primed and motivated to add to their jewelry collection this year, before Brady tore his ACL. No doubt it’s small consolation to Pats fans, but the season isn’t a complete loss. Brady’s gone, and the economy is just as bad here as in Detroit. But at least we don’t have to watch the Lions.

Rhode whine

In this week’s “Life” section of Time magazine, critic Joel Stein tries a different wine from every state, ranking them from excellent to good to bad to undrinkable. Rhode Island’s randomly chosen vintage, a Vidal Blanc from Sakonnet Vineyards of Little Compton, gets a “Good” score, but you’d hardly know it from the mini-screed that Stein delivers on the pop-up online version of his review. It follows, with snarky deconstruction by your faithful beer-biased blogger:

This wine is from Rhode Island, but you’d have to look at the tiny print on the back of the label to figure that out. Instead, what appears in a big font on the front and back is Southeastern New England. Is Rhode Island that embarrassing? [Obviously not a Blog on the Half Shell reader. Of course Rhode Island is that embarrassing. Only Florida and California can keep up with us in this category.] And is Southeastern New England incredibly prestigious-sounding? [It is if you’re from Southeastern New England.] Is this why the Patriots refuse to say they’re from Boston? [No, the Patriots refuse to say they’re from Boston because they’re not from Boston. They play in Foxborough. Which can also be spelled “Foxboro.” That’s one of the neat things about living in Southeastern New England. Multiple spellings of place names.] The name of the town where this wine is made, Little Compton, [a.k.a. Common, Compton, Compton Commons or Little Compton Commons] doesn’t conjure up images of beautiful vineyards. But this vidal blanc isn’t too bad. It’s sticky-sweet, and I’ve had better vidal blancs, from New York and Canada [those names conjuring up vineyards for you, Stein] – and I don’t think vidal blanc is such a great varietal to begin with. [Hey, nobody forced you to try vidal blanc. You could have tried vidal sassoon, gore vidal or one of our other “varietals.”] But still, Rhode Island, dude, get some state pride. [Hey, New York critic dude, you want Rhody pride, next time try ranking states by their coffee milk.]

Rhody Universe: Beijing

North Kingstown swimmer Elizabeth Beisel did her best to promote her native state during interviews, peppering quotes about her Olympic experience with a liberal seasoning of “awesome.” In a Projo Sports Blog interview, she says: “Coming from Rhode Island, which is definitely not known as a swimming state, and to represent them [Rhode Islanders] in Beijing is awesome. Just to be from Rhode Island is awesome…” Well, yes it is, although it’s strange that an Ocean State would not be a swimming state. Earliest forms of the word “awesome,” described by some linguists as the official adjective of Rhode Island, go back to the 1500s, when it meant “inspiring awe” and “dreadful.” The Oxford English Dictionary traces its etymological transformation as the slang expression equivalent to a Michael Phelps swim or Usain Bolt sprint to a phenomenon that occurred in the 1980s. Far be it for the sun-deprived scribes at lowly Blog on the Half Shell to question the OED, but some of us were tossing “awesomes” around in the playgrounds, classrooms and school buses of Barrington throughout the 1970s, well before the decade of synthesizers and mullets. And you know that if Beisel had somehow managed to medal in Beijing, we would have heard her describe the Games as "wicked awesome," otherwise known as the official highest praise of Rhode Island.

Baywatch (The Lost Episode)

Spent the weekend kayaking that part of the bay that lies beyond my backyard. There were the requisite moments of poetry: osprey circling the masts of sailboats; breeze-blown monarch butterflies cascading over the waves; a kingfisher diving off the roof of a waterfront shack; thrashing bluefish, minnows and bait fish leaping out of the water; cormorants posing like “Playbird” models on slick, black sea boulders and herring gulls competing with laughing gulls in a cacophony of gull karaoke. But the mornings weren’t entirely peaceful or pleasant. Green slime oozed on Annawamscutt Beach. Noxious algae mats, ranging in size from shoebox to Four Square court, meandered as floating dead zones along the shore. The coast near Nayatt Point burbled in stringy, goopy streaks of brown and green, the color of septic tea. And in the channel between Bullock’s Point in Riverside and Lavins and Cove Haven marinas in West Barrington, a fish kill: Dozens of dead menhaden, bloated and belly-up, stinking to high heaven, staring vacantly into the void. A combination of natural conditions and manmade factors (cesspools and wastewater) cause these kills and the toxic bloom that turns Narragansett Bay green at the gills. It appears that saving the bay won’t be as easy as Pamela Anderson and David Hasselhoff made it look.