title: Birthday and date of death.
abstract: The relation between birthday and date of death has so far been studied from two different perspectives: birthdays were either conceived of as emotionally invested deadlines motivating people to ward off their death which causes a 'dip' in death rates before their birthday, or they were considered as stressful events leading to an increase of mortality on or after their birthday. Using a collection of biographies of famous people from the whole world and another of well-known Swiss citizens we tested hypotheses derived from these assumptions. Neither the 'death-dip' hypotheses nor the 'birthday stress' hypothesis was supported by our results.
authors: Psychiatrische und Nervenklinik, Universitätskrankenhauses Hamburg-Eppendorf.
authors: M C
authors: MC
authors: Angermeyer
authors: L
authors: L
authors: Kühn
authors: P
authors: P
authors: Osterwald
mesh_terms: D000846:Anniversaries and Special Events; D003643:Death; D006801:Humans; D011641:Public Relations; D013315:Stress, Psychological; D013557:Switzerland; D013997:Time Factors