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Writing (Journaling) About Stress Helps
Asthma, Arthritis
Writing about stressful life events helped reduce symptoms
of asthma and rheumatoid arthritis in patients with
these chronic illnesses. The effects of the writing
exercise were still evident four months later and resulted
in clinically meaningful improvements in patient symptoms.
The new findings add to a growing body of evidence
linking mental health to physical well-being. Although
researchers are not sure how this technique -- called
"expressive writing" -- can lead to improvements
in health, they speculate that it may help people better
cope with stress, which can take a deleterious toll
on health.
On average, asthma patients who wrote about their most
stressful life event showed a 19% improvement in a specific
measure of lung function, while control asthma patients
showed no change, the researchers report. Rheumatoid
arthritis patients were found to have a 28% reduction
in symptoms, whereas control arthritis patients did
not improve.
Ventilation of negative emotion, even just to an unknown
reader, seems to have helped these patients acknowledge,
bear, and put into perspective their distress. In this
and a growing number of studies, it is not simply mind
over matter, but is it clear that mind matters.
The Journal of the American Medical Association April
14, 1999;281:1304-1309, 1328-1329
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