overview: A state of gratitude lowers the systolic blood pressure response throughout the stress test experience, indicating that gratitude has a unique buffering effect on both response to and recovery from psychological stress.
sauce: BIAL Foundation
A study of 68 adults by Irish university researchers found that gratitude has a unique stress-buffering effect on both response and recovery from acute psychological stress, and is associated with improved cardiovascular health. found to contribute.
Knowing that stress affects humans and impacts health and well-being, i.e. causes high blood pressure and increases cardiovascular disease and coronary heart disease, knowing our reactions to stress, It’s important to find out if there are any factors that can play an important stress-buffering role.
The article “Appreciation, Influence Balance, and Stress Buffering: A Growth Curve Examination of the Cardiovascular Response to a Laboratory Stress Task” was published in January. Journal of PsychophysiologyBrian Leavy, Brenda H. O’Connell, and Deirdre O’Shea suggest that previous research suggests that gratitude and emotional balance play an important stress-relieving role, but that these variables are They propose that little is known about its effects on cardiovascular recovery. From acute psychological stress.
That’s the focus of a study by researchers from Ireland’s Maynooth University and the University of Limerick, which sought to examine whether emotional balance moderates the relationship between gratitude and cardiovascular responses to acute psychological stress.
The study, conducted at the Irish University of Maynooth, involved 68 undergraduate students (24 males and 44 females) aged 18 to 57 years. This study used a within-subject experimental design with a lab task in which stress was induced in participants and cardiovascular reactivity and recovery in response were measured.
The results showed that a state of gratitude predicted a lower systolic blood pressure response throughout the stress test period. This means that the state of gratitude has a unique stress-buffering effect on both the response to and recovery from acute psychological stress. We also found that emotional balance amplifies the state’s gratitude effects.
These findings are clinically useful because there are several low-cost gratitude interventions that can contribute to well-being (Wood et al., 2010). For example, previous studies have shown that heart patients who use gratitude diaries have better cardiovascular outcomes than those who do not (Redwine et al., 2016).
Combined with the results of this study and previous studies, gratitude may be a useful intervention point for improving cardiovascular health.
About this stress research news
author: press office
sauce: BIAL Foundation
contact: Press Office – BIAL Foundation
image: image is public domain
Original research: closed access.
“Appreciation, Influence Balance, and Stress Buffering: Investigating Growth Curves of Cardiovascular Responses to Stress Tasks in the Laboratory” by Bryan Levy et al. Journal of Psychophysiology
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overview
Appreciation, Influence Balance, and Stress Buffering: Investigating Growth Curves of Cardiovascular Responses to Stress Tasks in the Laboratory
Previous research has shown that gratitude and emotional balance play an important role in stress buffering. However, so far there has been little research on the impact of gratitude and emotional balance on cardiovascular recovery from acute psychological stress and whether emotional balance moderates the relationship between gratitude and cardiovascular response to acute psychological stress. research is limited.
In this study, 68 adults completed measures of gratitude status, positive and negative impact, and completed a laboratory-based cardiovascular stress test protocol. It incorporates a 20-minute acclimation period, a 10-minute baseline, a 6-minute arithmetic stress task, and an 8-minute recovery period.
A mixed-effects growth curve model was fitted, and the results showed that the state of gratitude predicted a lower systolic blood pressure response over the stress test period. Influence balance moderated the association between state gratitude and diastolic blood pressure response to stress, and was found to amplify the effects of state gratitude.
These findings suggest that a state of gratitude has a unique stress-buffering effect on both response and recovery from acute psychological stress.
