Resolve your argument for better overall health
If you want a longer, healthier life then resolve your arguments by end of the day as it reduces the emotional response associated with the disagreement, a new study revealed.
On the day of an argument or avoided argument, people who felt their
encounter was resolved reported roughly half the reactivity of those
whose encounters were not resolved, the findings indicated.
"Everyone experiences stress in their daily lives. You aren't going to stop stressful things from happening. But the extent to which you can tie them off, bring them to an end and resolve them is definitely going to pay dividends in terms of your well-being," said researcher Robert Stawski from the Oregon State University.
For the study, published in The Journals of Gerontology, the team used
data from an in-depth survey of more than 2,000 people who were
interviewed about their feelings and experiences for eight days in a
row.
The researchers looked at reports of both arguments and avoided
arguments, defined as instances where the person could have argued about
something but chose to let it slide so as not to have a disagreement.
They then measured how the incident affected the person's reported
change in negative and positive emotions, both for the day of the
encounter and the day after it occurred.
The measure of how an experience
affects someone emotionally, an increase in negative emotions or a
decrease in positive emotions, on the day it occurs is known as
"reactivity," while "residue" is the prolonged emotional toll the day
after the experience occurs.
The results showed that on the day of
an argument or avoided argument, people who felt their encounter was
resolved reported roughly half the reactivity of those whose encounters
were not resolved.
On the day following an argument or
avoided argument, the results were even starker -- people who felt the
matter was resolved showed no prolonged elevation of their negative
affect the next day.