The health benefits of friends

We may get jealous of their new car or their fabulous designer boots, but jealousy aside we all love hanging out with our friends; whether we’re watching the game or having a gossip over a cup of coffee. Yet it turns out that our friends aren’t just fun, they also give us a much-needed boost to our health.

Friendship health benefit 1: Gossip
Everyone loves the cheap thrill that gossip gives us and now we know that gossiping with our friends actually has health benefits. Researchers found that people feel better when they are able to gossip about someone who is behaving badly and when they get to warn others about deceit. This kind of gossip is called ‘pro-social’ gossip and gossip it is thought to lower our stress levels.

Friendship health benefit 2: Weight
Although seeing our friends often involves coffees and indulgent meals, research has found that our friends can help us stay slim and healthy. A study published in PLOS ONE found that people who hung around with slim friends tended to be healthy and slim too, whilst those people who had overweight friends would typically gain weight. The stronger your relationship is with your friends, the more likely you are to be similar in size and weight. One of the researchers, Alexandra Brewis Slade, PhD, believes there is a correlation between friends’ weights and our own because we mirror the behaviour of our social circles.

Friendship health benefit 3: Survival
Ditching your buddies to spend an evening watching TV at home is going to do nothing for you if you want to live to an old age. A 10 year Australian study found that older people with a large amount of friends were 22 per cent less likely to die during the study than those older people with fewer friends. Also Harvard researchers suggested that strong social ties may promote brain health as we age and another study found that those with high social relationships were 50 per cent more likely to survive during the period of study. So it turns out friends are not just there for secret sharing and karaoke fun.

Friendship health benefit 4: Heart
We all know that bad men and women can break our hearts, but who knew good friends could mend them? Researchers have found that people who have strong social ties have better heart health than those who have poor social ties. This heart health is thought to come from lower blood pressure, which is a result of good friendships. Shockingly, the findings suggest that these weak social ties could in fact double your risk of heart disease.

Friendship health benefit 5: Laughter
Remember that time when you and your friends laughed so hard that you nearly cried? Moments like these are hard to beat, yet catching a fit of giggles is in fact great for our health. Researchers have compared the act of laughing to having a mild workout because when we laugh we engage our muscles, raise our pulse and we breathe faster, meaning that more oxygen is pumped through to our tissues.

Friendship health benefit 6: Stress
There is evidence that having a shoulder to cry on is great for your health and your stress levels; especially if you are a woman. When women get stressed they release the hormone oxytocin. This hormone makes women want to chat with their friends and open up about why they are feeling the strain. Interestingly, by opening up and sharing women release more oxytocin, which is thought to calm us and would therefore help to relive some of the original stress we felt.

Top foods to keep you young
Top 10 must-eat foods for a healthy diet