Over stressed? Need to relax? Well, according to scientists the best way to beat stress is by simply helping others. A simple act of kindness can act as a buffer against stress and can give your mood a boost.
When we were stressed we tend to look for other’s assistance, but it turns out that it is much better to lend our hand to others when life gets a bit too much.
Researchers suggest that after a stressful day, doing something as small as holding the door open for someone else had a great impact on reducing stress.
The study also found out that people who do more helpful behaviors are better in coping with stress while those who don’t help as much will find stress more as a negative impact.
Dr Emily Ansell, a psychologist at Yale University’s school of medicine who led the research said,
“Stressful days usually lead us to have a worse mood and poorer mental health, but our findings suggest that if we do small things for others, such as holding a door open for someone, we won’t feel as poorly on stressful days.
‘Our research shows that when we help others, we can also help ourselves.
‘The holiday season can be a very stressful time, so think about giving directions, asking someone if they need help, or holding that elevator door over the next month. It may end up helping you feel just a little bit better.”
The researchers asked 77 adults aged between 18 and 44 to conduct daily assessments over a 14-day period, listing any stressful events they experienced. They were also asked to rate their mental health for that day and the emotions they felt, along with any helpful behaviors they had performed.
These included helping someone with homework, holding open a door or carrying someone’s shopping up the stairs for them.
The results, showed that helping others boosted the participant’s daily well-being and the more they help someone, the more they have a positive mood. These were published in the journal Clinical Psychological Science.
Dr Ansell said helping others also influenced how those who took part responded to stress positively, unlike those who rarely help, they reacts to stress like a heavy burden.
She also said, “It was surprising how strong and uniform the effects were across daily experiences. For example, if a participant did engage in more pro-social behavior on stressful days there was essentially no impact of stress on positive emotion or daily mental health. And there was only a slight increase in negative emotion of stress if the participant engaged in more pro-social behaviors.”
This is a good news, beating stress doesn’t need to burn your pocket and it’s totally free! Yeah, it’s a really good feeling when you help others even in just simple ways.
Source: Daily Mail
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