Objective: To derive a score for finishing in the top three positions of the television show, Love Island, UK. Design: A retrospective study was undertaken using data from all previous contestants. Results: A score predicting show success termed DO-BITS (different coupling approaches [islanders pursuing one or many people on the show], Original islander [being on the show from the start], [being] Brunette, [having] intimate relationships on screen, Tradesman [occupation before being on the show] and Short name [having a four-letter first name]) was developed. The accuracy of this score in this derivation cohort yielded a C-statistic of 0.85. Conclusion: This simple, novel score provides a practical tool to assess the likelihood of success on Love Island.

Lay abstract

Love Island is a reality television program that has attracted a lot of attention, including participation from medical and scientific professionals. In order to help people decide whether to potentially make a life changing move to participate on the show, we sought to identify predictors of show success. Our results enabled the generation of a simple score called DO-BITS that provides a practical tool to assess the individual likelihood of success on Love Island, potentially aiding decision making regarding whether or not to apply to participate on the show and/or behavior as a contestant on the show.

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Vol. 7, No. 1

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History

Received 1 October 2020

Accepted 29 October 2020

Published online 30 November 2020

Published in print January 2021

Information

Keywords

Author contributions

SV Ramagopalan conceived the study, SV Ramagopalan, A Simpson, S Graham, TP Leahy and C Sammon analyzed the data and drafting and revised the manuscript.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank all Love Island cast and crew members for providing the authors a considerable amount of entertainment over the years and Dr. Ling who introduced one of the authors to the show and inspired, taught, entertained, encouraged and helped.

Financial & competing interests disclosure

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.

Ethical conduct of research

Ethical approval was not required. This study is based on data that is publicly available. No patients or members of the public were involved in the study.

Open access

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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