"Don't worry, be happy," is more than just a song lyric. A growing body of evidence supports an association between optimism and healthy aging.

A new study has found that being more optimistic appears to promote emotional well-being by limiting how often older men experience stressful situations, like arguments, or effecting the way they interpret such stress.

"This study tests one possible explanation, assessing if more optimistic people handle daily stress more constructively and therefore enjoy better emotional well-being," said corresponding author Lewina Lee, PhD, clinical psychologist and assistant professor of psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine.

The researchers surveyed for over a decade the same 233 older men who had completed an optimism questionnaire. 14 years later, they reported daily stressors, along with positive and negative moods, on eight consecutive evenings three times over an 8-year span.

The researchers found more optimistic men reported not only lower negative mood, but also more positive mood (beyond simply not feeling negative).

They also reported having fewer stressors—which was unrelated to their higher positive mood but it explained their lower levels of negative mood, according to the findings published in the Journals of Gerontology, Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences.

Studies have increasingly supported the idea of optimism as a resource that may promote good health and longevity.

An 11-year study completed in 2016 measured the optimism and pessimism of 2,267 men and women over 52 as they aged and found that those who died from coronary heart disease were more pessimistic than average.

Another researcher that examined links between optimism and heart health in 5,100 adults reported in 2015, "Individuals with the highest levels of optimism have twice the odds of being in ideal cardiovascular health compared to their more pessimistic counterparts."

A Harvard study looking at nearly 7,000 older adults counted the most optimistic people as having a 73% reduced risk of heart failure over the follow-up period.

What causes these associations between optimism and health? Lee said we know very little about the underlying mechanisms.

"Stress, on the other hand, is known to have a negative impact on our health. So, by looking at whether optimistic people handle day-to-day stressors differently, our findings add to knowledge about how optimism may promote good health," says Lee.

…Especially as people age.

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