Smile a while, give your face a rest - Smiling regularly may lift your mood and boost your health

AP:

Reminding yourself to smile more often may not only help you make friends but also improve your mood.

Rather than waiting for a reason to smile, simply making the physical effort to turn a frown upside down could influence your emotions, experts say.

Research supports the idea that smiling can have a positive effect.

Some earlier studies have explored the “facial feedback hypothesis”, according to Jeanne Tsai, a longtime psychology professor at Stanford University who runs the Culture and Emotion Lab. In one classic study conducted in the late 1980s, researchers asked participants to hold a pencil between their lips to create either a smiling or frowning expression while watching a positive film clip, such as a cartoon. Those who smiled reported experiencing the sensation of smiling more strongly and finding the clip more amusing.

“When we’ve done that demonstration in classes, it works,” Tsai said. “When you’re doing it in a room by yourself, you’re not doing it in a social interaction; maybe it’s making you remember, or it’s an effect of remembering some good thing that happened, and that would put you in a better mood.”

At the Orange County Academy of Sciences and Arts in Southern California, the power of a smile is taken very seriously. An entire section on the charter school group’s website is dedicated to its philosophy that a smile can make a difference.

“Smiling creates a supportive classroom culture that makes students relaxed, active, and motivated,” according to the website. “It increases emotional well-being, lowers stress, and gives students confidence.”

SMILING BENEFITS HEALTH

Dr Judy Ho, a Los Angeles clinical and forensic neuropsychologist who also teaches at Pepperdine University, discusses smiling as a coping strategy with some patients suffering from depression or anxiety.

“I’m not suggesting that that’s the only way they can fix things,” Ho said. “It’s just like another thing that you can add to your toolbox.”

Smiling can affect one’s level of cortisol, a hormone the body releases partly to help regulate stress and mood, according to Ho. Smiling can affect brain chemicals that are associated with positive feelings, including endorphins, dopamine and serotonin.

“People who smile during stressful tasks generally demonstrated lower heart rates during recovery than those maintaining neutral expressions,” Ho said. “Smiling also reduced aspects of the body’s physiological stress response.”

The hope is if you smile enough, you will start feeling it emotionally.

“In some ways it’s like a mediating effect,” she added.

lifestyle@gleanerjm.com