Scientists reveal foolproof formula for a lifetime of happiness - and it takes just five minutes to perform
Just five minutes a day performing 'micro-acts of joy' that foster positive emotions is enough to banish stress, boost health, and improve sleep quality, experts found.
According to stress expert Dr Elissa Epel, listening to laughter, admiring a flower on a local walk or doing something nice for a friend can measurably improve people's emotional well-being and attitudes toward life.
Epel, an expert on stress and ageing who oversaw the new research, said: 'We were quite taken aback by the size of the improvements to people's emotional well-being.'
Epel's team at the University of California San Francisco studied almost 18,000 people, mainly from the U.S., UK, and Canada, for the web-based 'Big Joy Project' over a two-year period to 2024.
It was the first study to look at whether small, easy-to-do acts that take minimal time could have measurable and lasting effects on people. Participants were asked to perform five-ten minute acts of joy for a week.
Prof Epel said the thousands of people who took part in her project matched the positive results achieved by programs that required months of classes, for hours at a time.
The study, published in the Journal Of Medical Internet Research, asked participants to perform seven acts over seven days, such as sharing a moment of celebration with someone else, doing something kind for another person, making a gratitude list or watching an awe-inspiring video about nature.
Prof Epel said her team picked tasks that were focused on promoting feelings of hope and optimism, wonder and awe, or fun and silliness.
Each task took under ten minutes, including answering short questions.
Participants were quizzed about their emotional and physical health at the start and end of the week-long project, providing a measure of their emotional well-being, positive emotions, and 'happiness agency', along with their stress and sleep quality.
The psychologists explained that emotional well-being includes how satisfied people are with their lives and whether they have purpose and meaning.
Happiness agency is how much control they feel they have over their emotions.
The team found improvements in all areas, and the benefits increased depending on how fully people participated in the program, meaning those who completed all seven days saw greater benefits than those who only managed two or three.
While further research was needed, according to Epel, it's clear that a daily dose of joy could help people in trying times: 'All of this well-being stuff, it's not a luxury.
'We often say that we'll let ourselves be happy once we've reached some point or finished some task. Well, we want to flip that – we need the energy of joy to get through the hard parts. These are really necessary skills.'
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