Eudaimonic Well-being: Mother Teresa Had Better Immune Cells Than You Due To Purpose In Life?
Tuesday, July 30, 2013 - 05:20
in Psychology & Sociology
Positive psychology is so powerful it can change gene expression, according to a paper in PNAS. A good state of mind, your happiness levels, affect your genes, say academics in psychoneuroimmunology, psychology and psychiatry at UCLA and the University of North Carolina. Different types of happiness have different effects on the human genome, they have determined. People who have high levels of what is known as eudaimonic well-being - the kind of happiness that comes from having a deep sense of purpose and meaning in life, like Mother Teresa - showed very favorable gene-expression profiles in their immune cells. They had low levels of inflammatory gene expression and strong expression of antiviral and antibody genes. read more