She may give you a headache, but your heart will thank her

Good diet and regular exercise are the two most potent ways to improve cardiovascular and mental health, but new research has unmasked a complement to these traditional methods: companionship.

Scientists at the State University of New York at Oswego found that when people are in the company of their partners or spouses they have lower blood pressure than when they socialize with less familiar people or simply spend time alone.

Brooks Gump, the study's lead author, says the results are in sync with other studies that link marriage to good cardiovascular health. The report, which was funded by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, was published in Psychosomatic Medicine.

Gump and his colleagues studied 120 people in various social settings over six days. They found blood-pressure levels dropped slightly when a person was with a spouse or significant other. Intriguingly, it didn't matter whether the couple thought their marriage was good or bad.

"It's completely consistent with what we find," says John Cacioppo, co-director of the Institute for Mind and Biology at the University of Chicago. Lonely people have higher stress levels, sleep less and are more hostile, he says.

COPYRIGHT 2001 Weider Publications
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning