The Science of Giving

Want to improve your mood and level of calm while simultaneously improving the world around you? According to research, doing something kind for someone else can change your brain's activity and elicit happy emotions, providing you with deep mental and physical benefits.

You may experience favorable health improvements, such as reduced stress and anxiety and an improvement in mood, when you offer kindness to your community through gifts, charitable donations, random acts of kindness, and community work. Additionally, giving can lengthen your life and keep you healthy. In general, those who volunteer are happier and healthier than those who do not.

You were created to give.

Infants help others, according to research, despite being too young to have learned manners and kindness. Even young children, who are infamous for not wanting to share, find giving more fulfilling than receiving.

According to a University of British Columbia study, when young toddlers were invited to share goodies with others, they exhibited more enjoyment. The findings of this study were interpreted by the researchers to suggest that whenever pro-social behavior—such as volunteering and charitable giving—is engaged in, our level of happiness rises.

We all have the ability to be nice and helpful to others; we just need to nurture this aspect of ourselves on a regular basis.Negative life events may tragically undermine this lovely tendency if we fail to do so.

How Generosity Affects You

Many studies have revealed ways that giving improves our lives, including:

• Giving enhances one's health.

Giving, according to research, promotes greater health. According to Stephen Post, a professor of preventive medicine at Stony Brook University, in his book Why Good Things Happen to Good People, giving to others has been shown to boost health benefits in people with chronic illnesses. Additionally, the University of California, Berkeley, study contends that giving may enhance physical health by lowering stress. Last but not least, a collaboration between Johns Hopkins University and the University of Tennessee found that participants who helped others had lower blood pressure than those who did not.

• Being generous fosters a grateful mindset.

Giving helps you feel grateful because it puts things in perspective. Giving to those in need makes you feel grateful. And another essential component of happiness and health is thankfulness. Volunteering enables you to see more of the world and teaches you to be grateful for what you already have.

• Giving fosters interpersonal connections.

According to a number of studies, being generous is ultimately repaid by others. These constructive activities foster a spirit of cooperation and trust that improves your relationships. Additionally, when you give a gift, you develop a connection with the recipient. All of this is crucial since maintaining excellent mental and physical health depends on having constructive social relationships.

• Sharing motivates others.

People who have been on the receiving end of a good deed frequently desire to spread that feeling and assist others. James Fowler, a researcher at the University of California, San Diego, discovered that a single act of kindness can lead to a chain reaction of compassion in which multiple additional acts of kindness are performed by other people.

• Giving makes people happier.

You go through a physiological alteration known as a "helper's high" when you make other people happy by giving them a gift, encouragement, or assistance. Endorphins, which are released by your brain, cause a euphoric bodily sensation. This "high," which is comparable to a drug-induced sensation, gives you a rush that makes you feel good naturally and makes you exhilarated, enthusiastic, and less melancholy. This feeling of optimism is comparable to how you feel after working out.