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New year, new me

Back to the smell of sweat and feet at the local gym and the miserable faces walking past McDonald’s with the hunger for a greasy Big Mac.Yes it is that time again as we drag ourselves into 2016 hoping for change.

The start of January brings hope of turning over a new leaf and reinventing yourself after the large consumption of pigs in blankets and mulled wine that we all stuffed in over Christmas.

Every year, we pledge the same old vows to improve ourselves.However according to YouGov, 1 in 3 people fall off the wagon and ditch their new year resolutions by the end of January.

It is not as a bad as the 16% of people who believe they will fail in the first week on January.

The most popular resolutions to make are health related; either to lose weight, get fit and to start eating more healthily.

Four in ten Britons have vowed to lose weight in 2016.

This ends up with most of the population turning to yo-yo dieting and a new gym membership.

The British Council has started a new campaign to get the country to learn a foreign language as their resolution by using the new hashtag #LearnALanguage.

Since many employers now wish for the candidate to have a foreign language under their belt, the council have said if a person learns one phrase a day, they would be able to have a simple conversation with someone by next year.

Last year, YouGov’s survey said that 11% would give up alcohol and this led to over two million people being sober for the whole month.

Alcohol Concern hopes that the number will rise this year.

Cancer Research have also started their campaign for people who want to give up alcohol to be a part of January’s Drythalon, to stay sober for a whole month.

Their website calculates how much money a person would save over the course of the month if they stayed sober for 31 days.

Only 5% say they would give up smoking for the new year, there is help from the NHS and Nicorette to help gradually ease out of using cigarettes through nicotine patches and e- cigarettes.

There are other campaigns throughout the year to help stop smoking including Stoptober.

After conducting a Bournemouth Rock survey on the topic, 81% of students have made a new year’s resolution.

Last year, 30% students who made a New Year resolution failed in less than a month to keep it up.  After talking to some Bournemouth University students around the campus about their new year plans, students are planning on starting their health kick now rather than in later life.

Engineering student James Harker, from Winton, plans to get fit this year, “it’s always been my resolution to get fit, but I never end up doing it and I get lazy by the end of February.

Hopefully this year will be different, so far it’s going well”.

In our survey, 44% said they would keep up with their current resolution for a month compared to the 16% who think they can do it for the whole year.

Students who also live in Winton, Psychology student Ciara Mockett and Public Relations student Laura Salvada-Boussi, both want to travel more this year “ to enlighten oneself and discover more cultures”,

“Even though we’re both still 19 we want to travel as much as possible before we end up working in 9-5 jobs.” In our survey we asked if there was a point of having a new year’s resolution, 75% replied yes.

 However, marketing student Grace Harper who lives in Charminster is not planning to make one this year, “To be honest I don’t think there’s a point of them. I end up forgetting about it halfway through the year and then I get angry at myself for not completing it so now I just don’t bother”.

 Starting a new year with a goal can strive people to do better. Even if it is not for health reasons, their resolution could be happiness or to have less stress.

 It could be a small goal that can easily be achieved for example watching less TV or spending less time on social media.

According to a poll by StatisticBrain, the ninth most popular new years resolution is to fall in love. There is potential to think that people have lost their way in what the true meaning of love is if they are attempting to force themselves into falling for someone as part of their new years ritual.

 Having a new year’s resolution can be beneficial to hopefully having a healthier and happier life for years to come. It all depends on how much people want to change.