While staying optimistic can be tricky during these uncertain times, it could actually help you to live longer, according to a new study.
Researchers from Boston University have found that optimistic people live longer, healthier lives than pessimists, and say it’s because they have fewer stressful events to deal with.
‘Stress is known to have a negative impact on our health,’ explained Dr Lewina Lee, who led the study.
‘By looking at whether optimistic people handle day-to-day stressors differently, our findings add to knowledge about how optimism may promote good health as people age.’
Researchers from Boston University have found that optimistic people live longer than pessimists, and say it’s because they have fewer stressful events to deal with (stock image)
While previous research has found a link between optimism and healthy ageing, until now it’s been unclear how optimism impacts health.
‘This study tests one possible explanation, assessing if more optimistic people handle daily stress more constructively and therefore enjoy better emotional well-being,’ explained Dr Lee.
In the new study, the team followed 233 older men over a 24 year period.
At the start of the study, which began in 1986, the men completed a questionnaire to assess their levels of optimism.
Then, from 2002-2010, the men were questioned again on up to three occasions about their daily stressors and mood on eight consecutive evenings.
The results revealed that more optimistic men not only reported lower negative mood, but also more positive mood.
They also reported having fewer stressors, which was unrelated to their higher positive mood, but explained their lower levels of negative mood.
In their study, published in The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, the researchers wrote: ‘Findings from a sample of older men suggest that optimism may be associated with more favorable emotional well-being in later life through differences in stressor exposure rather than emotional stress response.
‘Optimism may preserve emotional well-being among older adults by engaging emotion regulation strategies that occur relatively early in the emotion-generative process.’
While the study focused on older men, the researchers believe the findings are likely to apply to older women too.
‘Less is known about age differences in the role of optimism in health,’ Dr Lee added.
While previous research has found a link between optimism and healthy ageing, until now it’s been unclear how optimism impacts health
Unfortunately, the study comes shortly after research revealed that optimism isn’t as ingrained in human nature as previously thought.
Researchers from the University of Bath found that humans aren’t predisposed to optimism, nor do we go around with ‘a pair of rose-tinted glasses’ – a belief that may have biased the findings of previous studies.
The experts cast doubt over past research supporting the existence of ‘irrational optimism bias’ – that humans innately have a feeling that everything will be alright.
