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Forbes - Does winning an Oscar extend your life? Scientists disagree

Published: 26 February 2011

It’s got to be one of the most cocktail-party-worthy scientific studies ever: a 2001 article in the Annals of Internal Medicine that showed actors and actresses who won Academy Awards lived four years longer than mere nominees.

The same researchers followed up in 2005 with a paper showing a similar benefit for directors who won Oscars. The finding, by noted University of Toronto researcher Donald Redelmeier, is important because it may give us information about whether success, in and of itself, makes people healthier.

Because it’s so eye-catching, the Oscar-as-life-extender result has been mentioned during the Oscar telecast and covered by the Associated Press and National Public Radio… But it may not be true, and somehow nobody, including me, bothered to notice. …

But James Hanley, an epidemiologist at McGill University, did question it. And he stands by his argument, which is based on something called the “immortal time bias.” This idea is probably best explained by the Bill Murray movie Groundhog Day, which didn’t win an Oscar but should have.

Because he’s living the same day over and over, the Murray character can do improbable things: memorize an episode of Jeopardy!, learn to play jazz piano,  woo Andie MacDowell. Hanley argues that the same effect is in play with Oscar winners, and Redelmeier and his co-author didn’t properly account for it.

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