LONDON, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) -- Researchers have found new evidence that explains how some aspects of our personality may affect our health and wellbeing, supporting long-observed associations between aspects of human character, physical health and longevity.
A team of researchers at the University of Nottingham in England carried out a study to examine the relationship between certain personality traits and the expression of genes that can affect our health by controlling the activity of our immune systems.
A group of 121 ethnically diverse and healthy adults were recruited. These were comprised of 86 females and 35 males with an average age of 24. The participants completed a personality test which measures five major dimensions of personality - extraversion, neuroticism, openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness.
Blood samples were collected from each volunteer for gene expression analysis and their typical smoking, drinking and exercise behaviors were also recorded for control purposes.
The study, published in the British scientific journal Psychoneuroendocrinology, did not find any results to support a common theory that tendencies toward negative emotions such as depression or anxiety can lead to poor health. What was related to differences in immune cell gene expression were a person's degree of extraversion and conscientiousness.
Our results indicated that extraversion was significantly associated with an increased expression of pro-inflammatory genes and that conscientiousness was linked to a reduced expression of pro-inflammatory genes. Professor Kavita Vedhara, who led the research, concluded.
He explained that, although the biological mechanisms of these associations need to be explored in future research, these new data may shed new light on the long-observed epidemiological associations between personality, physical health, and human longevity.