7 hr 09 min
Air Quality: 3 - Low Risk
You feel better when you smile.
Smiling increases mood-enhancing hormones while decreasing stress-enhancing hormones, including cortisol, and adrenaline. It also reduces overall blood pressure. And because you typically smile when you’re happy, the muscles used trigger your brain to produce more endorphins—the chemical that relieves pain and stress.
Smiling can help you live longer.
According to Harvard Medical School’s Harvard Health Publishing, optimism—which is linked to smiling—is associated with a lower risk of early death from cancer and infection. And according to a study in the peer-reviewed journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, people who experience higher levels of optimism have a longer life span. The research included data from two large population studies that totaled 71,400 individuals and found that both optimistic men and women demonstrated exceptional longevity, i.e., surviving to 85 years old.
Initially, smiling can have different effects on how you’re perceived.
When it comes to attraction, there’s usually no accounting for taste. However, according to a study that examined sexual attractiveness of individuals based on expressions of happiness, pride, and shame, the results were rather definitive. For men, happiness (demonstrated by smiling) was the most attractive female emotion expression; for women, happiness was among the least attractive male emotion expressions. Ultimately, it was determined that distinct expressions of emotion have differing effects on sexual attractiveness that vary by gender (but not by age).
23 minutes / 1746 steps / 1.28 km
