|
Husbands and wives can really get under each other's skins. In fact, new
evidence suggests that nasty marital spats temporarily weaken the immune
systems of both spouses, potentially boosting their susceptibility to
physical illness (9/4/93: Science News)
Bruce Bower reports from Toronto at the
annual meeting of the American Psychological Association
"Marital tiffs
spark immune swoon..."
"Husbands
and wives can really get under each other's skins. In
fact, new evidence suggests that nasty marital spats
temporarily weaken the immune systems of both spouses,
potentially boosting their susceptibility to physical
illness. Newlyweds who employ hostile tactics while
discussing problems in their relationship show far
greater drops in several immune measures over the next 24
hours than recently married couples who take a more
conciliatory approach to problems, assert Janice
K. Kiecolt-Glaser of Ohio State University College of
Medicine in Columbus and her colleagues. Wives experience
larger immune drops than their husbands after an unkind
exchange, the researchers note. Women may prove superior
to men in detecting a spouse's hostile emotional
messages, Kiecolt-Glaser suggests." "Couples
who held the most negative discussions.... displayed the
steepest drops in two types of white blood cells."
...but hypnosis offers immune aid
"Hypnosis strengthens the
disease-fighting capacity of two types of immune cells,
particularly among people who enter a hypnotic trance
easily, report Patricia Ruzyla-Smith of Washington State
University in Pullman and her co-workers. This is the
first solid evidence that hypnosis can modify the immune
system far more than relaxation alone, asserts Washington
State's Arreed F. Barabasz, who helped conduct the
study." Volunteers who performed self-hypnosis twice
a week were compared with those floating in a floatation
sensory deprivation tank and those who did neither.
"Students who underwent hypnosis displayed larger
jumps in two important classes of white blood cells than
participants in the other two groups."
|