Emily Bambury
Professor Dempster
UNIV 200
3 March 2016
Annotated Bibliography #4: Winning the jackpot and depression: Money cannot buy happiness
1. How does the acquisition of sudden wealth relate to happiness?
a. How do lottery winners deal with their newfound wealth?
b. Ultimately, does the lottery produce temporary or lasting happiness?
2. Citation:
Nisslé, Sonja, and Tom Bschor. “Winning the jackpot and depression: Money cannot buy
happiness.” International Journal of Psychiatry in Clinical Practice 6.3 (2002): 183-186. Web.
17 Feb. 2016.
3. Qualification of Authors:
Sonja Nisslé works in the Department of Neurology at Cantonal Hospital of Aarau in
Switzerland. Tom Bschor works in the Department of Psychiatry at the Technische Dresden in
Germany.
4. Claim: The study talks about two women who developed depression as a result of large lottery
winnings.
5. Sub Claims:
1) Patient One: her mother won lottery and split between three children, she left work
because of anxiety and depression, was hospitalized for 3 months in the Department of
Psychiatry at Freie Universitat Berlin (183-184)
2) Patient Two: her and her husband won the lottery (played regularly),
agoraphobia/anxiety developed, began therapy and medication (developed a
dependency), increased depression when they started building a house, was hospitalized
for 3 months in the Department of Psychiatry at Freie Universitat Berlin (184)
6. Evidence:
Patient One
Clinical Findings (184)
-Symptoms of depression improved as a result of psychotherapy, amitriptyline
and lithium augmentation (drugs) and sleep deprivation
-I’m very confused as to why less sleep would help depression.
Four-Year Follow-Up (184)
-Medication doses slowly lowered nine months after leaving the hospital
-Psychotherapy for three and a half years
-No signs of depression or episodes
-Did not work since hospitalization (considering going back)
Patient Two
Therapy (185)
-Experienced withdrawal
-Took antidepressants but stopped after 12 week
-Behavioral therapy was able to help control her anxiety and agoraphobia
Four-Year Follow-Up (185)
Discussion (185)
-Both patients suffered from stressful childhoods and both had symptoms of anxiety and
depression before winning the lottery.
-1960-1980 (too old?)
7. Important Quotations:
“Paykel calculated that the risk of becoming depressed was six times higher in the 6 months after
a highly stressful event.” (185)
-While winning the lottery is mostly viewed as a dream come true many people
underestimate the prolonged stress that comes along with winning. Although these two
women were already sick, winning the lottery did seem to heighten their anxiety and
cause them to spiral further into their illnesses.
“In a remarkable recent investigation, Gardner and Oswald assumed a positive correlation
between increase in income and happiness and came to the conclusion that a windfall of
approximately 1M £ sterling (1.5 M US$) is needed to move a person from close to the bottom
of a happiness frequency distribution to close to the top.” (185)
-This study by Gardner and Oswald would be a good one to look into because it is unlike
most studies, which usually focus on the negative side effects of large winnings or
promotions.
-It might be a good one to look into if I need more sources at the end.
“In 1978, Brickman and colleagues published a survey of 22 major lottery winners. They were
systematically interviewed not with regard to psychological illness, but with regard to happiness,
and were compared with a group of controls and a group of paralyzed accident victims.” (185)
-This is another article found. It sounds like it has information that would be very useful
to my paper but it is fairly old. But if there have not been any other studies done like it, is
it okay to use it? I think it is because it is cited in almost every other source I have so I’m
using it.
-Adaptation level theory: a person’s current happiness is determined by their past
experiences with happiness (186)
-With the lottery people, people found less satisfaction in everyday things
-This reminds me of the experiment in source 5 (Money giveth, money
taketh away: the dual effect of wealth on happiness)
“Unexpectedly winning millions is in itself a dramatic change to the life situation to which one is
accustomed and has imagined will continue to its conclusion, and the magnitude of this change
may even equal that of events of severe loss. On the other hand, of course, several important
factors, such as the winner’s families or other key persons remain constant.” (186)
-This contrast can create anxiety and stress. People are still the same but now they just
have more money (or want some of your money). There is often an assumption that
money will be able to solve problems and fix things but for the most part life stays
constant, just the amount of money you have changes. Does this point to the fact that
once the money is gone, life will return to normal?
“In a systematic interview of 22 major lottery winners, only 23% stated that their lifestyle in
general had changed.” (186)
-This means that the other 77% reported that their life remained fairly unchanged. This
23% likely houses the bankrupt and squandering winners. So then these cases are the
minority. It is not the norm to lose it all after winning big. Most people’s lives stay stable.
The women in this study seem to be a special case because they had preexisting
conditions that with a small spike in stress, worsened quite a bit.
8. Why use this source?
This source is a case study which makes it unique compared to all my other sources. I had
trouble finding the main claim and subclaims because of this but I think that the information will
be useful in the beginning or ending paragraphs as anecdotal evidence. This article mentions
another article I found. I’m having trouble because I thought maybe the article was too old but
since I am seeing it cited time and time again, I think I should definitely include it.