Can hugs protect you from the flu?
Saturday August 26, 2023.
Because of some creative researchers and courageous study subjects, we now strongly suspect that being hugged reduces the toxic impact of stress on the body. according to researchers who deliberately exposed their study subject population to a cold virus..
Yeah, they did that.
The study indicates that human hugging acts as a form of social support and buffers humans from catching a virus, and even reduces their cold symptoms if they do get sick.
How this odd study was conducted
These researchers certainly were thinking outside the box to explore how much a hug can help a human.
The study asked over 400 healthy adults how much social support they believed they were getting from other humans.
The researchers also documented the concrete AF mathematical hug count. They asked How often do you get hugged? How often are you in conflict with other humans? was a also a great control question. This research was, after all, from Carnegie Mellon. It doesn’t get any better than that.
Ok, you’ll feel better now… the study subjects consented to being exposure to a cold virus in the lab they were handsomely compensated at $1,000 a head..
Their condition was carefully monitored in quarantine. Any emergent symptoms were carefully tracked and documented for duration and intensity.
The power of hugs and social supports…
Professor Sheldon Cohen, who led the study, explained its rationale:
“We know that people experiencing ongoing conflicts with others are less able to fight off cold viruses.
We also know that people who report having social support are partly protected from the effects of stress on psychological states, such as depression and anxiety.
We tested whether perceptions of social support are equally effective in protecting us from stress-induced susceptibility to infection and also whether receiving hugs might partially account for those feelings of support and themselves protect a person against infection.”
The results showed that humans who, concrete AF, were hugged more often, or who experienced a greater degree of social support were less likely to catch the influenza in the first place.
Here’s something that’s also fascinating. The humans who did catch a cold had measurably less severe symptoms if they were hugged more often, and felt more ongoing social support.
Professor Cohen Explained:
“This suggests that being hugged by a trusted person may act as an effective means of conveying support and that increasing the frequency of hugs might be an effective means of reducing the deleterious effects of stress.
The apparent protective effect of hugs may be attributable to the physical contact itself or to hugging being a behavioral indicator of support and intimacy.
Either way, those who receive more hugs are somewhat more protected from infection.”
Final Thoughts
I’ve written about the power of hugs as an intimacy hack several times before. Recently Finnish researchers explained additional benefits from hugging.
When human intimacy works, our bodies cry out in gratitude. We always healthier at our baseline, when we’re feeling loved and understood at least 80% of the time.
I hope to have the privilege of helping you with that.
I’ve been told this might be a difficult winter for flu and COVID. The new emerging variant, BA.2.86 has at least 36 detected sub-variants. Let’s hope they get the fall booster right. It’s a complex, SWAG (sophisticated, wild-ass guess).
Start getting your antibodies built up now. Hug your kids more too.
Try an additional 6 second hug per week.
Also try sleeping naked. Use your bodies as chemical factories to build up your immunity and baseline health to prep for the winter of 2023-24.
Thrive well, and Godspeed.
RESEARCH:
Cohen S, Janicki-Deverts D, Turner RB, Doyle WJ. Does hugging provide stress-buffering social support? A study of susceptibility to upper respiratory infection and illness. Psychol Sci. 2015 Feb;26(2):135-47. doi: 10.1177/0956797614559284. Epub 2014 Dec 19. PMID: 25526910; PMCID: PMC4323947.
