Why Danes are Smug?

Danes are unrivalled in satisfaction with life. The University of Leicester recently published the World Map of Happiness with Denmark as number one. For more than 30 years this country with five million inhabitants has ranked first in Eurobarometer surveys. More than two thirds of Danes are "very satisfied" with their lives according to these surveys. In no other Eurobarometer country has this proportion exceeded a half, and for most of the countries the proportion is less than a third....

BMJ hypothesized the following as the top three reasons for this unusual happiness of Danes.

Hair colour—It may indeed be the case that "blondes have more fun." This hypothesis was launched in the 1950s by a commercial slogan for a hair dye and was cemented in popular culture in 1978 by rock musician Rod Stewart's album of the same title. Sweden, however, has a higher prevalence of blondes than Denmark.1

Genes—Genetic factors might influence differences in life satisfaction within a country,2 and Danes might have a special genetic constitution. Genotypes in Sweden, however, are similar to those in Denmark because most Swedes were Danes until the 17th century.

Food—Meals in Denmark can be politely described as unmemorable. "Danish cuisine" is an oxymoron, except perhaps the open faced "butter breads" that accompany the beer and aquavit Danes consume for lunch. Older Danes satisfy their hunger with potatoes, gravy, and a bit of pork, and younger ones devour hotdogs, hamburgers, and Baltic-style pizzas. Danish cuisine has some similarities with food from Switzerland and Austria, the second and third happiest nations according to the World Map of Happiness; this suggests that the consumption of comfort foods may be important for life satisfaction.

Finally, here is the Map of World Happiness published by the University of Leicester. I see that we Indians are not as happy as some others. But one (positive) way to look at it is, we (among others) are neither happy nor unhappy - a quality of a Karma Yogi?!