Thinking During Fights May Improve Health, Marriages
November 27th, 2009
When experiencing a marital conflict, many people may be prone to simply speaking their minds, without putting too much thought into their words. But aiming towards the incorporation of greater introspection and through fullness during argumentsmay greatly improve physical health and the quality of marriages, suggests a new study recently published in the journal Health Psychology. The study examined couples who had a supportive discussion, later followed by a discussion about their most contentious issue, and were measured as to their cytokine or inflammatory protein levels before and after the events. Software was also used to analyze the presence and rates of “cognitive” words which indicated thoughtfulness. While such words did not have an effect on cytokine levels during relaxed conversation, levels were much lower during heated debates when signs of thoughtfulness were present. As cytokines may be linked to heart disease and some types of cancer, incorporating more cognitive processes into marital discussions may not only help marriages, but preserve overall health, as well.
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Comments
It is common knowledge that putting in thought before blurting out stuff is good and will prevent a lot of conflicts. I don’t think a study was required to ascertain this.
Yes, it really does! Its not without a reason that kids are taught to count till 10 when they feel angry… it is to divert their attention. Likewise, talking about the problem is much better than going all out in conflict and hurting each other. Why, peaceful talks are even brokered between nations in order to prevent a war! ;)
We say and do many things in rage but later when we think about what we said and did, we often feel like we should not have done those things and sometimes even hate ourselves for having done so… doing this thinking during the fight and before actually performing the actions will go a long way in making us happy and also preventing us from hurting others around us.
I always have a better outcome when I think before I speak. That should be the given rule for everyone to follow.
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