We all love weekends. We don’t need scientific evidence to tell us that, but now we actually have it.

The study, published in the Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, explains why we’re happier during weekends.

“There’s more connection with other people and more self-direction. Wherever you don’t have autonomy or don’t feel relatedness, your well-being will be lower.”

The research also found that participants felt greater competency on weekends.  It also states that people who engage in behaviors that increase competency but may be stressful or unpleasant in the moment still experience greater happiness and satisfaction in the long term, especially if they also experience autonomy and connectedness.  “When you clean the house, it may not make you happy in the moment, but it may make you satisfied, and that will make the weekend better,” says Ryan Howell, an assistant professor of psychology at San Francisco State University who was not involved in this study.

You can read more about it here.

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A new study suggests that parents lave lower blood pressure than adults without kids. The study was conducted among 198 married men and women between the ages of 20 and 68 were monitored over a 24 hour period.

Parents had lower blood pressure presumably because researchers believe the results are due to parents having a higher self esteem.

They feel they have a greater purpose in life regardless of the daily struggles involving their children.

Not all experts believe these are the normal for everybody. The relatively short time frame which did not include the children being around the parents may have lent to the positive results.

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This post is tagged lower blood pressure, parents, weekends