February 24, 2010
Karina Davidson
Columbia University Medical Center
10 year study of 1700 healthy men and women
First study to show independent relationship between positive emotions and the incidence of Cornary Artery Disease.
Happy = 22% less likely to have a heart attack or suffer symptoms of heart disease
And if eating makes them the most happy?
Reuters
Haven’t read the study but that’s a lot of variables to line up.
How was happiness (enjoyment, satisfaction) assessed/scored?
Subjective vs objective vs physical findings vs labwork/EKG vs family history vs home-work environments?
If the subject is happy, the people around them are happy.
A happy external environment has physiologic benefits far beyond internal happiness, which is dependent on brain chemistry.
Folks with “normal” brain chemistry experience “happiness” a notch above the baseline.
Depression resides below the baseline making “normal happiness” physiologically impossible.
Happy translates to less unhappy = closer to the baseline.
With mania, “happiness” begins a notch above and keeps going.
Extremes, yes, but it illustrates happiness cannot always be chosen or the perception of it controlled or reliably quantified.
