It would be interesting if that is a major factor. For most the darkness is probably a major factor. Not only in that region, but alcohol consumption in the northern European countries is quite high.
Anecdotal evidence from Finland is that everyone is drunk after work, especially on Fridays. It is difficult to find anyone sober. Perhaps it was only my special colleagues though...
Difficult study though. I don't know how much coal mining is still active, probably not too much. I guess space weathers primary effect would be cancer rates because of the radiation but mining work probably has an influence too. Otherwise the sometimes colorful night sky might at least offer some solace for the long darkness.
Last summer I searched for jobs as a software dev in that region because it was so hot... Not seriously of course but there are a few opportunities if someone needs to escape the heat.
FWIW, the Svalbard government actually does have somewhat strict alcohol rationing [1], although perhaps the Russian parts of the island aren't subject to it. I think the quota averages out to around 2 drinks per day, although I suppose if you saved it all for the weekend you could still get drunk.
Intechopen is not peer reviewed at all. They publish anything that claims to be science, from quantum to traditional chinese medicine articles about qi and energy flows.
That's quite a lot of dependent variables for such a low N, skeptical. Also claims like these require extraordinary evidence:
It has now been established [33, 34, 35, 36] that brain rhythms
include ultra-slow frequency oscillations (USFO), which are usually
not detected by standard electroencephalogram measurements. The
frequency range of these oscillations corresponds to very
low-frequency pulsations Pc3–4 characteristic of a polar cusp. Among
the ultra-slow fluctuations, the rhythm with a period of 15–40 s is
remarkable in that the human brain is accompanied by transitions of
levels of consciousness, for example, transitions to the hypnotic
state. The fluctuations in the decasecond range correspond to the
period of fluctuations of the pulsations Pc3, the amplitude and
intensity of which are significantly higher during the polar day
than in the polar night. It is not excluded that Pc3–4 pulsations
can contribute, along with other factors, to the unstable mental
state of the residents of arch. Spitsbergen.
(But then maybe that's just my unstable mental state talking, having lived there for a year when I was five. I didn't notice any geocosmic agents, I mostly just remember the reindeer and the heating pipes criss-crossing Longyearbyen.)
There is some evidence, mostly fMRI-based as far as I'm aware, of slow (~10s period) fluctuations between functional coupling of brain regions on a macroscopic level. The associated networks are often referred to as resting state or default-mode networks. See e.g. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3596417/ I am not aware of 15-40s period transitions that are "accompanied by transitions of levels of consciousness", but would be interested in case anyone knows what these refer to.
Anecdotal evidence from Finland is that everyone is drunk after work, especially on Fridays. It is difficult to find anyone sober. Perhaps it was only my special colleagues though...
Difficult study though. I don't know how much coal mining is still active, probably not too much. I guess space weathers primary effect would be cancer rates because of the radiation but mining work probably has an influence too. Otherwise the sometimes colorful night sky might at least offer some solace for the long darkness.
Last summer I searched for jobs as a software dev in that region because it was so hot... Not seriously of course but there are a few opportunities if someone needs to escape the heat.