Positive Psychology Column for 2-29-04 By Tom Muha, Ph.D. Happier people are also healthier The new science of success and satisfaction that has emerged in the new millennium is proving to have significant health benefits as well as helping people to achieve higher levels of happiness.   The March 2004 Consumer Reports On Health issue examines how using positive psychology principles in your life is related to physical health outcomes. Their investigation determined, “Happier people are often healthier people, and not just because their good health improves their mood.” Consumer Reports found that teaching young people how to be more satisfied by acquiring skills that increase optimism and decrease hostility meant that for decades to come they had a far lower risk of developing a chronic disease. The benefits of developing an upbeat mental outlook later in life were abundant as well, creating a profound positive influence even when people were facing life threatening health issues. Long- term studies of people suffering from serious illnesses such as cancer and HIV found that those who had the highest levels of positive emotions were less likely to die during the study - regardless of the seriousness of their illness or the drugs they received. People who are happier simply live longer, say the scientists at the Mayo Clinic. In a 30 year study they found that those subjects who were pessimistic had a one in five chance of dying prematurely. In another seven year study, older adults who did not have hopeful attitudes about the future had death rates almost three times higher than their more optimistic counterparts, even when the statistics were adjusted for health status, smoking and age. One’s quality of life was found to be greatly influenced by a their level of optimism, according to the Mayo Clinic’s 30 year study, with pessimists having higher risks of developing both mental and physical problems. Additional studies have shown that people who are unhappy, stressed or angry have a higher risk of heart disease, dental problems and recover more slowly from surgery. Unhappy people are also more likely to get Alzheimer’s disease. The journal Neurology published a study in their December 2003 issue that reported finding people prone to experiencing depression, anger, anxiety or helpless feelings had double the chance of developing Alzheimer’s than those who had learned better coping mechanisms. The best news of all, however, is that it’s now possible to improve a person’s level of happiness. People can be classified on a scale that ranges from -10 to +10, with zero being the neutral mid-point. If you’re in an unhappy state most of the time such as being depressed, anxious, stressed or angry, then you fall into the negative side of the scale. For almost all of the last century, psychologists were focused on diagnosing and treating people who were in the -1 to -10 range. Over the past 20 years there has been steady improvement in developing effective treatment strategies for this population. But even those therapies could only get you up to zero because psychologists didn’t have any reliable data that described the joyful side of the scale. Enter the very recent research from the positive psychologists who have been able to define what it means, for example, for a person to have a happiness level of +3. More importantly, positive psychologists know what it takes to be at the +8 or +10 level and can teach people how to move up to those higher levels of life satisfaction. Controlling your thoughts by changing your self-talk is remarkably effective at transforming negative views of the world that are a hazard to your health. Learning how to think more optimistically about your future, for example, gives you more energy and helps you to become proactive in producing positive outcomes in your life. There are many skills that can learned to move you to higher levels of happiness. However, like all skills they must be practiced in order to become good at using them when the negative events occur. People who learn to use these tools aren’t happy all of the time. But they can contain their negative emotions and talk their way out of a bad mood. Rather than prolonging their involvement in bad times, happy people are able to redirect their energy to become absorbed in activities that are genuinely rewarding. Consumer Reports On Health concluded, “Gaining a measure of control may take persistence and perhaps professional counseling, but the mood improvement may be substantial.” And now we know that learning to be happier helps you to be healthier as well.                                                    Tom Muha is a psychologist in Annapolis. He welcomes your comments and questions. To contact him call (443) 454-7274 or email him at tom@achievinghappiness.com.