When we ’re in a good mood, we’re more likely to engage in healthy behaviours

By Emily Reynolds On some days, waking up and engaging in healthy behaviours is easy — you get up, hit the gym, drink enough water and spend time with friends. On others, even getting out of bed seems like too much effort. Knowing how to encourage healthy behaviours is therefore pretty useful, and much research has been done on what makes them stick, whether that’s avoiding indulgent friends or paying to remove temptation. And a new study from a Kent State University team, published in Motivation and Emotion, finds that positive mood can also encourage healthy behaviour — at least in the short term. Over the course of ten days, participants responded to questionnaires administered by email five times a day at random times. First, they rated their current emotional state (e.g. scared, guilty, distressed, happy, or satisfied) using a seven point scale; these ratings were combined to produce overall positive and negative mood scores. Participants also reported whether they had engaged in four healthy behaviours: exercising, spending time with someone supportive, taking part in a hobby, and relaxation or meditation. As the team anticipated, participants who generally felt more positive mood were likely to engage in healthy behaviours, while those who felt more negative mood were less likely to engage in these behaviours. And momentary changes in mood contributed to such behaviours within participants as well. When participants reported more positive mood at...
Source: BPS RESEARCH DIGEST - Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Tags: Emotion Sport Source Type: blogs