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10.01.2025

Your partner's positive emotions reduce your cortisol production

The more positive your emotions, the less cortisol your body produces. And if you are in a steady relationship, positive emotions from your partner also put a brake on the amount of cortisol your body produces. We don't have to explain to the readers of this free web magazine what effects this can have.

Study
Psychologists at the University of California Davis measured the cortisol concentration in the saliva of 321 couples several times a day. The men and women studied were aged 57-87.

Each time the study participants gave a saliva sample, the study participants reported whether they experienced positive emotions, such as happy, interested, and relaxed, or negative emotions, such as nervous, angry, overwhelmed, and sad.

Results
Positive emotions lowered the concentration of cortisol in saliva. You can see that in the figure below, top left. Bottom left, you can see that negative emotions actually increased the concentration of cortisol.

This is hardly surprising. Cortisol is a stress hormone.

Positive emotions from the study participants' partners also lowered cortisol concentrations. This was also the case when the study participants themselves reported negative emotions. A positive mood from the partner therefore helps prevent their own negative emotions from increasing cortisol concentrations.

Negative emotions from the partner did not lead to a significant increase in cortisol concentrations.

"We didn't find any links between a person's cortisol levels and their partner's negative emotions, suggesting that older adults may shield or protect their partner from sharing, physiologically, in negative emotions", explains first author Tomiko Yoneda in a press release. [psypost.org, december 7 2024.]

Conclusion
"A total PSA screening tool can reflect the prostate health status of men and help identify the need for vitamin D supplementation, which can be implemented at the earliest", write the researchers.

"Hence, a routine biochemistry panel for screening prostate health in men should consider total PSA and vitamin D levels so that individuals deficient in vitamin D are identified and interventional strategies can be planned for their well-being."

Source:
Cureus. 2024 Dec 2;16(12):e74959.

More:
Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2024 Sep:167:107118.

Archives:
Psychology of Longevity
Blocking Cortisol
Psychology

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