Does this article explain why we hang out on the WTM boards? (long)

[Gwen in VA]

UCLA STUDY ON FRIENDSHIP AMONG WOMEN

By Gale Berkowitz

 

A landmark UCLA study suggests friendships between women are special.

They shape who we are and who we are yet to be. They soothe our tumultuous

inner world, fill the emotional gaps in our marriage, and help us remember

who we really are. By the way, they may do even more.

 

Scientists now suspect that hanging out with our friends can actually

counteract the kind of stomach-quivering stress most of us experience on a

daily basis. A landmark UCLA study suggests that women respond to stress

with a cascade of brain chemicals that cause us to make and maintain

friendships with other women. It's a stunning find that has turned five

decades of stress research---most of it on men---upside down. "Until this

study was published, scientists generally believed that when people

experience stress, they trigger a hormonal cascade that revs the body to

either stand and fight or flee as fast as possible," explains Laura

Cousino Klein, Ph.D., now an Assistant Professor of Biobehavioral Health

at Penn State University and one of the study's authors. "It's an ancient

survival mechanism left over from the time we were chased across the

planet by saber-toothed tigers.

 

Now the researchers suspect that women have a larger behavioral repertoire

than just "fight or flight." "In fact," says Dr. Klein,"it seems that when

the hormone oxytocin is released as part of the stress responses in a

woman, it buffers the "fight or flight" response and encourages her to

tend children and gather with other women instead. When she actually

engages in this tending or befriending, studies suggest that more oxytocin

is released, which further counters stress and produces a calming effect.

This calming response does not occur in men", says Dr. Klein, "because

testosterone---which men produce in high levels when they're under

stress---seems to reduce the effects of oxytocin. Estrogen", she adds,

"seems to enhance it."

 

The discovery that women respond to stress differently than men was made

in a classic "aha!" moment shared by two women scientists who were talking

one day in a lab at UCLA. "There was this joke that when the women who

worked in the lab were stressed, they came in, cleaned the lab, had

coffee, and bonded", says Dr. Klein. "When the men were stressed, they

holed up somewhere on their own. I commented one day to fellow researcher

Shelley Taylor that nearly 90% of the stress research is on males. I

showed her the data from my lab, and the two of us knew instantly that we

were onto something."

 

The women cleared their schedules and started meeting with one scientist

after another from various research specialties. Very quickly, Drs. Klein

and Taylor discovered that by not including women in stress research,

scientists had made a huge mistake: The fact that women respond to stress

differently than men has significant implications for our health.

 

It may take some time for new studies to reveal all the ways that oxytocin

encourages us to care for children and hang out with other women, but the

"tend and befriend" notion developed by Drs. Klein and Taylor may explain

why women consistently outlive men. Study after study has found that

social ties reduce our risk of disease by lowering blood pressure, heart

rate, and cholesterol. "There's no doubt," says Dr. Klein, "that friends

are helping us live." In one study, for example, researchers found that

people who had no friends increased their risk of death over a 6-month

period. In another study, those who had the most friends over a 9-year

period cut their risk of death by more than 60%.

 

Friends are also helping us live better. The famed Nurses' Health Study

from Harvard Medical School found that the more friends women had, the

less likely they were to develop physical impairments as they aged, and

the more likely they were to be leading a joyful life. In fact, the

results were so significant, the researchers concluded, that not having

close friends or confidantes was as detrimental to your health as smoking

or carrying extra weight! And that's not all! When the researchers looked

at how well the women functioned after the death of their spouse, they

found that even in the face of this biggest stressor of all, those women

who had a close friend confidante were more likely to survive the

experience without any new physical impairments or permanent loss of

vitality. Those without friends were not always so fortunate.

 

Yet if friends counter the stress that seems to swallow up so much of our

life these days, if they keep us healthy and even add years to our life,

why is it so hard to find time to be with them? That's a question that

also troubles researcher Ruthellen Josselson, Ph.D., co-author of "Best

Friends: The Pleasures and Perils of Girls' and Women's Friendships (Three

Rivers Press, 1998). "Every time we get overly busy with work and family,

the first thing we do is let go of friendships with other women," explains

Dr. Josselson."We push them right to the back burner. That's really a

mistake because women are such a source of strength to each other. We

nurture one another. And we need to have unpressured space in which we can

do the special kind of talk that women do when they're with other women.

It's a very healing experience."

 

Taylor, S. E., Klein, L.C., Lewis, B. P., Gruenewald, T. L., Gurung, R. A.

R., & Updegraff, J. A. Female Responses to Stress: Tend and Befriend, Not

Fight or Flight"

[Jane in NC]

Sounds reasonable to me.

 

Thanks girlfriend.

 

Jane

[Beth in SW WA]

Sounds reasonable to me.

 

Thanks girlfriend.

 

Jane

 

:iagree:

Thanks for sharing, Gwen!

[MaryM]

Great article. Thanks, Gwen!

 

Mary

[LisaNY]

What an interesting article!! Thanks so much for sharing that, Gwen! :001_smile:

[Lori D.]

"Does this article explain why we hang out on the WTM boards" -- I thought it was the late night cyber chocolate parties... [yum!]

[Michelle in MO]

Thanks for sharing---I'm printing it out for my oldest daughter to read. She needs to make some new friends, and I think this article might show her some practical reasons for friendships.

[MBH]

Thanks Gwen! It confirms what the Bible has to say:

 

Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some [is]; but exhorting [one another]: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching. Hebrews 10:25 :grouphug:

[Garga]

I agree with this wholeheartedly! I get blue (not depressed, just blue) when I'm not around my friends for a long stretch of time.

 

But I just came off of two Friday nights in a row, eating dinner with friends and playing UNO. I've been so peaceful and happy after those Friday nights.

 

Just having those couple of hours each Friday night has made me feel so good for the entire week following.

 

Here's to friends! :cheers2: (root beer in my cup...)

[Nan in Mass]

This makes much more sense. Banding together and checking on the children and making sure they are in good shape for stressful times sound better than fighting or flighting to me. You are probably right; probably a good bit of the attraction of the boards is explained by this. It is a very convenient way of banding together. Thank you SWB! How do we make sure she gets to read this?

-Nan