ATLANTA — Being grateful for the little things in life can have a lasting impact on your health.
Experience GPrevious studies have shown that gratitude is beneficial for your physical health and mental well-being, and now a new study finds that people who feel more grateful may also have a lower risk of death.
The researchers: Nurses’ Health SurveyApproximately 50,000 women aged between 69 and 96 participated and answered a six-item questionnaire. Thank you survey The 2016 survey asked participants to rank how much they agreed with statements like “There are many things in life to be grateful for” and “I am grateful for many different people,” allowing researchers to determine the percentage of women who were most and least grateful.
When the researchers looked at the data three years later, they found that the women who were most grateful had a 9% lower risk of death from all causes, including cardiovascular disease, cancer, and neurodegenerative diseases, according to the study published on July 3. Journal JAMA Psychiatry.
“Gratitude is powerful — it can have benefits for anyone, including improved happiness, reduced symptoms of at least mild depression, improved health, and prevention of premature death,” said Dr. Tyler VanderWiel, a professor of epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston and lead author of the study.
During the study’s three-year follow-up, 4,608 participants died: 2,153 were women who reported being the least grateful and 1,273 were women in the middle class. Of the most grateful women, 1,182 died.
Gratitude is powerful — it can increase happiness, reduce at least mild depression, improve health, and prevent premature death — and it’s something everyone can do.
– Tyler VanderWeel, PhD, lead study author
The study also found that people who reported greater feelings of gratitude tended to be slightly younger, in a relationship, more involved in social or religious groups, and in better overall health.
“I think the things that are going well in life, whether it’s your health or your social relationships, make you more grateful,” said Dr. IHarvard University Initiative on Health, Spirituality, and Religion.
In the lifespan analysis, the researchers controlled for data groups by comparing similar women who differed only in their gratitude scores, VanderWeel said. They controlled for factors such as psychological well-being, health problems, and other demographics, such as social and religious participation.
“Even after taking into account social connections, other aspects of psychological well-being, basic health characteristics, money, and income, we still found that grateful people had about a 10% lower risk of mortality than less-grateful people, which is very significant,” VanderWeel says. “Other factors are important, but they don’t explain the entire effect of gratitude.”
The study authors noted that participants were primarily older white women from the United States, and future studies with more representative samples are needed to further explore the effects of gratitude and longevity in other age groups.
How to Practice Gratitude
Feeling gratitude has been linked to improved physical health, including a stronger immune system, lower blood pressure, and a healthier heart. Grateful people also tend to get a better night’s sleep, have higher self-esteem, and lower levels of anxiety, stress, and depression.
While the new study looked at people who are naturally more grateful, there are ways to practice being more grateful in your daily life, said Emiliana Simon-Thomas, PhD, scientific director of the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley, a research institute that studies the psychology, sociology, and neuroscience of happiness.
“It’s really important that each person starts from their own comfort zone,” says Simon Thomas, who was not involved in the new study. “It’s not fair to demand gratitude from people, especially those who feel destitute, but it’s not unfair to point out some of the simple, easy, immediate sources of goodness that are actually a source of goodness.”
It could be something as simple as feeling the warm sun shining through a window on your shoulders. It’s about really noticing that there is something around you, even in difficult moments.
–Dr. Emiliana Simon-Thomas, Greater Good Science Center
“It could be something as simple as feeling the warm sun shining through a window on your shoulders. It’s really about realizing that there is something around you, even in difficult moments,” she added.
Simon Thomas recommends three strategies for cultivating greater gratitude.
- Keep a gratitude journal and write down the things you are grateful for: “A washing machine at home, electricity, the opportunity to go camping with friends – the list goes on.”
- Simon Thomas says that when you write letters to people who have had a positive impact on your life, you feel even more grateful when the letters arrive in their delivery box.
- Be more specific when expressing gratitude. When someone buys you a coffee to start your day, don’t just say “thank you,” say something like, “I really appreciate you buying me that coffee today. I know you have so much more to do… and your coffee helped me get so much done,” says Simon Thomas.
There’s no clear-cut view on how often you should show gratitude, says Simon-Thomas, and she recommends trying out different methods to find what feels right for you.
Not only is practicing gratitude key to your health and happiness, but it’s also important to work on feeling more gratitude because it’s a positive virtue and has a positive impact on your relationships, Watkins says.
