#healthpsychology — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #healthpsychology, aggregated by home.social.
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DATE: May 18, 2026 at 12:00PM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
-------------------------------------------------TITLE: Private religious practices are linked to lower blood pressure spikes during stress
New research suggests that engaging in private religious activities, like praying or reading sacred texts, tends to lower sudden spikes in blood pressure during stressful situations. The findings indicate that personal religious habits might provide a protective buffer against the physical toll of acute stress, while general spiritual feelings do not appear to offer the same physical benefit. This study was recently published in the journal Religion, Brain & Behavior.
Cardiovascular disease remains a leading cause of death worldwide. Psychological stress is a recognized risk factor for developing heart problems, rivaling physical factors like smoking, obesity, or a lack of exercise. When people experience sudden stress, their bodies react by increasing their heart rate and blood pressure. This biological change is known as cardiovascular reactivity.
Exaggerated or prolonged physical reactions to temporary stress can eventually damage the heart and blood vessels. Scientists suggest that finding ways to manage these bodily responses might help protect long-term heart health. Past studies have noted that religious and spiritual individuals often experience better physical health and lower rates of heart disease.
Despite this observed connection, past scientific work has frequently mixed up the concepts of religion and spirituality. Religion typically involves foundational principles, rituals, and practices centered around a higher power or specific tradition. Spirituality tends to be a broader concept, describing a personal search for meaning, inner peace, or a feeling of connection to the world at large.
Because modern society is seeing an increase in people who identify as spiritual but not religious, the authors wanted to separate these two ideas. They aimed to examine whether it is specific religious behaviors or general spiritual feelings that actually help the body cope with sudden stress.
“I have always been interested in psychosocial factors and how they influence health, particularly stress responses and the development of cardiovascular disease,” said Ailbhe Dempsey, a researcher in the Department of Psychology at the University of Limerick in Ireland. “Through my reading, I realized that religiosity and spirituality are often conflated and used interchangeably in the literature.”
“With the societal decline in traditional religion alongside the rise of more individualized forms of spirituality, I became interested in how these constructs may differently relate to health outcomes,” Dempsey explained. “I soon discovered that the literature in this area was both limited and mixed, particularly due to the poor distinction between religiosity and spirituality.”
“This sparked my interest in the topic and ultimately led me to explore it further in my PhD research,” Dempsey noted. Dempsey is affiliated with both the Study of Anxiety, Stress and Health Laboratory and the Health Research Institute at the university.
To explore these relationships, the researchers utilized data from a large national project known as the Midlife Development in the United States study. The final sample included exactly 628 middle-aged adults, ranging in age from 35 to 85 years old. The group was predominantly white and primarily identified with Christian traditions.
Participants visited a clinical research center for a standardized stress testing procedure. The researchers monitored three specific bodily functions throughout the experiment. They tracked systolic blood pressure, which measures the pressure in blood vessels when the heart beats. They also tracked diastolic blood pressure, which measures the pressure in vessels when the heart rests between beats, along with overall heart rate.
The testing protocol lasted about an hour and a half and involved three distinct phases. First, participants sat quietly for eleven minutes so researchers could record their resting baseline measurements. After this resting period, participants completed two difficult mental tasks designed to induce acute psychological stress.
The first stressor was a mental arithmetic task requiring participants to solve complex math problems under time pressure. The second stressor was a cognitive test where participants had to quickly identify font colors that did not match the written word, like the word “red” printed in blue ink. After completing these two six-minute stressful tasks, participants sat through a six-minute recovery period.
To measure private religious practices, the researchers used a survey that asked participants how often they prayed in private, meditated or chanted, and read religious literature. Higher scores on this three-item questionnaire indicated more frequent private religious activity. A separate five-item survey measured daily spiritual experiences, asking participants how often they felt a deep sense of inner peace, a connection to all life, or a profound appreciation for the world.
This spiritual scale did not mention God or specific religions to keep it separate from formal theology. The stress tasks successfully provoked a physical reaction across the sample. On average, the participants reported feeling significantly more stressed during the mental challenges compared to their resting state.
When the researchers analyzed the data, they discovered a specific association between private religious practices and the body’s reaction to stress. Participants who reported higher levels of private religious practices experienced significantly lower spikes in their systolic blood pressure during the stressful tasks.
“The findings suggest that private religious practices, such as private prayer, may help some individuals respond to stress in a healthier way by reducing physiological stress responses, particularly blood pressure reactivity (results remained after controlling for baseline cardiovascular measures, age, sex, race, BMI, smoking, or prescription medication use),” Dempsey said. Body mass index, or BMI, is a standard measure of body fat based on height and weight.
Interestingly, the researchers did not find any associations between daily spiritual experiences and any of the cardiovascular measurements. General feelings of inner peace or a connection to nature did not appear to dampen the physical stress response.
“In contrast, spirituality alone did not appear to influence these physiological measures,” Dempsey added. “The study highlights the importance of distinguishing between religiosity and spirituality, as they may affect health and stress responses in different ways.”
The authors suggest that deeply internalized religious beliefs, practiced regularly in private, might provide a structured framework for coping with life’s challenges. Engaging in personal religious habits may help people reframe stressful events, making them feel less threatening. This mental shift could be the reason why the body does not react as severely, experiencing less strain on the cardiovascular system over time.
By fostering positive meaning in life, religious practices may lead to frequent experiences of emotions such as gratitude and joy. Psychological theories suggest that these positive emotional experiences can expand a person’s cognitive flexibility. This helps individuals develop enduring resources like resilience, which tends to buffer against the negative physical effects of daily stressors.
While the study provides nuanced insights, the researchers acknowledge a few limitations in their work. Because the data was collected at a single point in time, the scientists cannot prove a direct cause-and-effect relationship. It is possible that people with naturally calmer physical stress responses are simply more drawn to private religious practices, rather than the practices themselves causing the physiological calmness.
“An important caveat is that the findings were specific to systolic blood pressure (SBP) reactivity, as private religious practices were not associated with diastolic blood pressure or heart rate responses to stress,” Dempsey explained. The SBP abbreviation specifically refers to the top number in a blood pressure reading, which showed the only significant physiological change in the models.
The sample was also somewhat limited in its diversity. Most participants were white and from Christian backgrounds, where practices like personal prayer and reading scripture are highly common.
“In addition, the sample was predominantly Christian, which may have influenced the observed associations,” Dempsey cautioned. “As religiosity can vary across cultural and social contexts, these findings may not generalize to more religiously diverse or less religious populations. Future research should therefore explore these relationships across different cultural and religious groups.”
There is also a possibility for misinterpretation regarding the content of the surveys. The private religious practices scale included meditation, which is a practice utilized in secular and spiritual contexts as well as religious ones. Future studies should separate meditation from explicitly religious actions to better understand what specifically drives the dampening of the stress response.
Additionally, while lower cardiovascular reactivity is generally seen as healthy, an unusually blunted physical response to stress can sometimes indicate negative health outcomes, such as depression or behavioral disengagement. The scientists suggest that more research is needed to fully understand when a muted stress response is adaptive and when it might be harmful.
Looking ahead, the researchers hope to build on these findings to better understand the distinct physical impacts of faith. “With regard to this research area, I hope to conduct longitudinal studies exploring different facets of religiosity and spirituality, including both positive and negative dimensions, across diverse cultural groups and age ranges,” Dempsey said.
The study, “Examining the associations between private religious practices, daily spiritual experiences, and cardiovascular stress reactivity,” was authored by Ailbhe Dempsey, Siobhán Howard, and Stephen Gallagher. The research was supported by Taighde Éireann and the National Institute on Aging.
-------------------------------------------------
DAILY EMAIL DIGEST: Email [email protected] -- no subject or message needed.
Private, vetted email list for mental health professionals: https://www.clinicians-exchange.org
Unofficial Psychology Today Xitter to toot feed at Psych Today Unofficial Bot @PTUnofficialBot
NYU Information for Practice puts out 400-500 good quality health-related research posts per week but its too much for many people, so that bot is limited to just subscribers. You can read it or subscribe at @PsychResearchBot
Since 1991 The National Psychologist has focused on keeping practicing psychologists current with news, information and items of interest. Check them out for more free articles, resources, and subscription information: https://www.nationalpsychologist.com
EMAIL DAILY DIGEST OF RSS FEEDS -- SUBSCRIBE: http://subscribe-article-digests.clinicians-exchange.org
READ ONLINE: http://read-the-rss-mega-archive.clinicians-exchange.org
It's primitive... but it works... mostly...
-------------------------------------------------
#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #PrivateReligiousPractices #PrayerAndStress #CardiovascularHealth #BloodPressureReactivity #ReligiosityVsSpirituality #StressManagement #HealthPsychology #MentalCopingStrategies #FaithAndWellness #CardioResearch
-
DATE: May 18, 2026 at 12:00PM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
-------------------------------------------------TITLE: Private religious practices are linked to lower blood pressure spikes during stress
New research suggests that engaging in private religious activities, like praying or reading sacred texts, tends to lower sudden spikes in blood pressure during stressful situations. The findings indicate that personal religious habits might provide a protective buffer against the physical toll of acute stress, while general spiritual feelings do not appear to offer the same physical benefit. This study was recently published in the journal Religion, Brain & Behavior.
Cardiovascular disease remains a leading cause of death worldwide. Psychological stress is a recognized risk factor for developing heart problems, rivaling physical factors like smoking, obesity, or a lack of exercise. When people experience sudden stress, their bodies react by increasing their heart rate and blood pressure. This biological change is known as cardiovascular reactivity.
Exaggerated or prolonged physical reactions to temporary stress can eventually damage the heart and blood vessels. Scientists suggest that finding ways to manage these bodily responses might help protect long-term heart health. Past studies have noted that religious and spiritual individuals often experience better physical health and lower rates of heart disease.
Despite this observed connection, past scientific work has frequently mixed up the concepts of religion and spirituality. Religion typically involves foundational principles, rituals, and practices centered around a higher power or specific tradition. Spirituality tends to be a broader concept, describing a personal search for meaning, inner peace, or a feeling of connection to the world at large.
Because modern society is seeing an increase in people who identify as spiritual but not religious, the authors wanted to separate these two ideas. They aimed to examine whether it is specific religious behaviors or general spiritual feelings that actually help the body cope with sudden stress.
“I have always been interested in psychosocial factors and how they influence health, particularly stress responses and the development of cardiovascular disease,” said Ailbhe Dempsey, a researcher in the Department of Psychology at the University of Limerick in Ireland. “Through my reading, I realized that religiosity and spirituality are often conflated and used interchangeably in the literature.”
“With the societal decline in traditional religion alongside the rise of more individualized forms of spirituality, I became interested in how these constructs may differently relate to health outcomes,” Dempsey explained. “I soon discovered that the literature in this area was both limited and mixed, particularly due to the poor distinction between religiosity and spirituality.”
“This sparked my interest in the topic and ultimately led me to explore it further in my PhD research,” Dempsey noted. Dempsey is affiliated with both the Study of Anxiety, Stress and Health Laboratory and the Health Research Institute at the university.
To explore these relationships, the researchers utilized data from a large national project known as the Midlife Development in the United States study. The final sample included exactly 628 middle-aged adults, ranging in age from 35 to 85 years old. The group was predominantly white and primarily identified with Christian traditions.
Participants visited a clinical research center for a standardized stress testing procedure. The researchers monitored three specific bodily functions throughout the experiment. They tracked systolic blood pressure, which measures the pressure in blood vessels when the heart beats. They also tracked diastolic blood pressure, which measures the pressure in vessels when the heart rests between beats, along with overall heart rate.
The testing protocol lasted about an hour and a half and involved three distinct phases. First, participants sat quietly for eleven minutes so researchers could record their resting baseline measurements. After this resting period, participants completed two difficult mental tasks designed to induce acute psychological stress.
The first stressor was a mental arithmetic task requiring participants to solve complex math problems under time pressure. The second stressor was a cognitive test where participants had to quickly identify font colors that did not match the written word, like the word “red” printed in blue ink. After completing these two six-minute stressful tasks, participants sat through a six-minute recovery period.
To measure private religious practices, the researchers used a survey that asked participants how often they prayed in private, meditated or chanted, and read religious literature. Higher scores on this three-item questionnaire indicated more frequent private religious activity. A separate five-item survey measured daily spiritual experiences, asking participants how often they felt a deep sense of inner peace, a connection to all life, or a profound appreciation for the world.
This spiritual scale did not mention God or specific religions to keep it separate from formal theology. The stress tasks successfully provoked a physical reaction across the sample. On average, the participants reported feeling significantly more stressed during the mental challenges compared to their resting state.
When the researchers analyzed the data, they discovered a specific association between private religious practices and the body’s reaction to stress. Participants who reported higher levels of private religious practices experienced significantly lower spikes in their systolic blood pressure during the stressful tasks.
“The findings suggest that private religious practices, such as private prayer, may help some individuals respond to stress in a healthier way by reducing physiological stress responses, particularly blood pressure reactivity (results remained after controlling for baseline cardiovascular measures, age, sex, race, BMI, smoking, or prescription medication use),” Dempsey said. Body mass index, or BMI, is a standard measure of body fat based on height and weight.
Interestingly, the researchers did not find any associations between daily spiritual experiences and any of the cardiovascular measurements. General feelings of inner peace or a connection to nature did not appear to dampen the physical stress response.
“In contrast, spirituality alone did not appear to influence these physiological measures,” Dempsey added. “The study highlights the importance of distinguishing between religiosity and spirituality, as they may affect health and stress responses in different ways.”
The authors suggest that deeply internalized religious beliefs, practiced regularly in private, might provide a structured framework for coping with life’s challenges. Engaging in personal religious habits may help people reframe stressful events, making them feel less threatening. This mental shift could be the reason why the body does not react as severely, experiencing less strain on the cardiovascular system over time.
By fostering positive meaning in life, religious practices may lead to frequent experiences of emotions such as gratitude and joy. Psychological theories suggest that these positive emotional experiences can expand a person’s cognitive flexibility. This helps individuals develop enduring resources like resilience, which tends to buffer against the negative physical effects of daily stressors.
While the study provides nuanced insights, the researchers acknowledge a few limitations in their work. Because the data was collected at a single point in time, the scientists cannot prove a direct cause-and-effect relationship. It is possible that people with naturally calmer physical stress responses are simply more drawn to private religious practices, rather than the practices themselves causing the physiological calmness.
“An important caveat is that the findings were specific to systolic blood pressure (SBP) reactivity, as private religious practices were not associated with diastolic blood pressure or heart rate responses to stress,” Dempsey explained. The SBP abbreviation specifically refers to the top number in a blood pressure reading, which showed the only significant physiological change in the models.
The sample was also somewhat limited in its diversity. Most participants were white and from Christian backgrounds, where practices like personal prayer and reading scripture are highly common.
“In addition, the sample was predominantly Christian, which may have influenced the observed associations,” Dempsey cautioned. “As religiosity can vary across cultural and social contexts, these findings may not generalize to more religiously diverse or less religious populations. Future research should therefore explore these relationships across different cultural and religious groups.”
There is also a possibility for misinterpretation regarding the content of the surveys. The private religious practices scale included meditation, which is a practice utilized in secular and spiritual contexts as well as religious ones. Future studies should separate meditation from explicitly religious actions to better understand what specifically drives the dampening of the stress response.
Additionally, while lower cardiovascular reactivity is generally seen as healthy, an unusually blunted physical response to stress can sometimes indicate negative health outcomes, such as depression or behavioral disengagement. The scientists suggest that more research is needed to fully understand when a muted stress response is adaptive and when it might be harmful.
Looking ahead, the researchers hope to build on these findings to better understand the distinct physical impacts of faith. “With regard to this research area, I hope to conduct longitudinal studies exploring different facets of religiosity and spirituality, including both positive and negative dimensions, across diverse cultural groups and age ranges,” Dempsey said.
The study, “Examining the associations between private religious practices, daily spiritual experiences, and cardiovascular stress reactivity,” was authored by Ailbhe Dempsey, Siobhán Howard, and Stephen Gallagher. The research was supported by Taighde Éireann and the National Institute on Aging.
-------------------------------------------------
DAILY EMAIL DIGEST: Email [email protected] -- no subject or message needed.
Private, vetted email list for mental health professionals: https://www.clinicians-exchange.org
Unofficial Psychology Today Xitter to toot feed at Psych Today Unofficial Bot @PTUnofficialBot
NYU Information for Practice puts out 400-500 good quality health-related research posts per week but its too much for many people, so that bot is limited to just subscribers. You can read it or subscribe at @PsychResearchBot
Since 1991 The National Psychologist has focused on keeping practicing psychologists current with news, information and items of interest. Check them out for more free articles, resources, and subscription information: https://www.nationalpsychologist.com
EMAIL DAILY DIGEST OF RSS FEEDS -- SUBSCRIBE: http://subscribe-article-digests.clinicians-exchange.org
READ ONLINE: http://read-the-rss-mega-archive.clinicians-exchange.org
It's primitive... but it works... mostly...
-------------------------------------------------
#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #PrivateReligiousPractices #PrayerAndStress #CardiovascularHealth #BloodPressureReactivity #ReligiosityVsSpirituality #StressManagement #HealthPsychology #MentalCopingStrategies #FaithAndWellness #CardioResearch
-
DATE: May 18, 2026 at 12:00PM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
-------------------------------------------------TITLE: Private religious practices are linked to lower blood pressure spikes during stress
New research suggests that engaging in private religious activities, like praying or reading sacred texts, tends to lower sudden spikes in blood pressure during stressful situations. The findings indicate that personal religious habits might provide a protective buffer against the physical toll of acute stress, while general spiritual feelings do not appear to offer the same physical benefit. This study was recently published in the journal Religion, Brain & Behavior.
Cardiovascular disease remains a leading cause of death worldwide. Psychological stress is a recognized risk factor for developing heart problems, rivaling physical factors like smoking, obesity, or a lack of exercise. When people experience sudden stress, their bodies react by increasing their heart rate and blood pressure. This biological change is known as cardiovascular reactivity.
Exaggerated or prolonged physical reactions to temporary stress can eventually damage the heart and blood vessels. Scientists suggest that finding ways to manage these bodily responses might help protect long-term heart health. Past studies have noted that religious and spiritual individuals often experience better physical health and lower rates of heart disease.
Despite this observed connection, past scientific work has frequently mixed up the concepts of religion and spirituality. Religion typically involves foundational principles, rituals, and practices centered around a higher power or specific tradition. Spirituality tends to be a broader concept, describing a personal search for meaning, inner peace, or a feeling of connection to the world at large.
Because modern society is seeing an increase in people who identify as spiritual but not religious, the authors wanted to separate these two ideas. They aimed to examine whether it is specific religious behaviors or general spiritual feelings that actually help the body cope with sudden stress.
“I have always been interested in psychosocial factors and how they influence health, particularly stress responses and the development of cardiovascular disease,” said Ailbhe Dempsey, a researcher in the Department of Psychology at the University of Limerick in Ireland. “Through my reading, I realized that religiosity and spirituality are often conflated and used interchangeably in the literature.”
“With the societal decline in traditional religion alongside the rise of more individualized forms of spirituality, I became interested in how these constructs may differently relate to health outcomes,” Dempsey explained. “I soon discovered that the literature in this area was both limited and mixed, particularly due to the poor distinction between religiosity and spirituality.”
“This sparked my interest in the topic and ultimately led me to explore it further in my PhD research,” Dempsey noted. Dempsey is affiliated with both the Study of Anxiety, Stress and Health Laboratory and the Health Research Institute at the university.
To explore these relationships, the researchers utilized data from a large national project known as the Midlife Development in the United States study. The final sample included exactly 628 middle-aged adults, ranging in age from 35 to 85 years old. The group was predominantly white and primarily identified with Christian traditions.
Participants visited a clinical research center for a standardized stress testing procedure. The researchers monitored three specific bodily functions throughout the experiment. They tracked systolic blood pressure, which measures the pressure in blood vessels when the heart beats. They also tracked diastolic blood pressure, which measures the pressure in vessels when the heart rests between beats, along with overall heart rate.
The testing protocol lasted about an hour and a half and involved three distinct phases. First, participants sat quietly for eleven minutes so researchers could record their resting baseline measurements. After this resting period, participants completed two difficult mental tasks designed to induce acute psychological stress.
The first stressor was a mental arithmetic task requiring participants to solve complex math problems under time pressure. The second stressor was a cognitive test where participants had to quickly identify font colors that did not match the written word, like the word “red” printed in blue ink. After completing these two six-minute stressful tasks, participants sat through a six-minute recovery period.
To measure private religious practices, the researchers used a survey that asked participants how often they prayed in private, meditated or chanted, and read religious literature. Higher scores on this three-item questionnaire indicated more frequent private religious activity. A separate five-item survey measured daily spiritual experiences, asking participants how often they felt a deep sense of inner peace, a connection to all life, or a profound appreciation for the world.
This spiritual scale did not mention God or specific religions to keep it separate from formal theology. The stress tasks successfully provoked a physical reaction across the sample. On average, the participants reported feeling significantly more stressed during the mental challenges compared to their resting state.
When the researchers analyzed the data, they discovered a specific association between private religious practices and the body’s reaction to stress. Participants who reported higher levels of private religious practices experienced significantly lower spikes in their systolic blood pressure during the stressful tasks.
“The findings suggest that private religious practices, such as private prayer, may help some individuals respond to stress in a healthier way by reducing physiological stress responses, particularly blood pressure reactivity (results remained after controlling for baseline cardiovascular measures, age, sex, race, BMI, smoking, or prescription medication use),” Dempsey said. Body mass index, or BMI, is a standard measure of body fat based on height and weight.
Interestingly, the researchers did not find any associations between daily spiritual experiences and any of the cardiovascular measurements. General feelings of inner peace or a connection to nature did not appear to dampen the physical stress response.
“In contrast, spirituality alone did not appear to influence these physiological measures,” Dempsey added. “The study highlights the importance of distinguishing between religiosity and spirituality, as they may affect health and stress responses in different ways.”
The authors suggest that deeply internalized religious beliefs, practiced regularly in private, might provide a structured framework for coping with life’s challenges. Engaging in personal religious habits may help people reframe stressful events, making them feel less threatening. This mental shift could be the reason why the body does not react as severely, experiencing less strain on the cardiovascular system over time.
By fostering positive meaning in life, religious practices may lead to frequent experiences of emotions such as gratitude and joy. Psychological theories suggest that these positive emotional experiences can expand a person’s cognitive flexibility. This helps individuals develop enduring resources like resilience, which tends to buffer against the negative physical effects of daily stressors.
While the study provides nuanced insights, the researchers acknowledge a few limitations in their work. Because the data was collected at a single point in time, the scientists cannot prove a direct cause-and-effect relationship. It is possible that people with naturally calmer physical stress responses are simply more drawn to private religious practices, rather than the practices themselves causing the physiological calmness.
“An important caveat is that the findings were specific to systolic blood pressure (SBP) reactivity, as private religious practices were not associated with diastolic blood pressure or heart rate responses to stress,” Dempsey explained. The SBP abbreviation specifically refers to the top number in a blood pressure reading, which showed the only significant physiological change in the models.
The sample was also somewhat limited in its diversity. Most participants were white and from Christian backgrounds, where practices like personal prayer and reading scripture are highly common.
“In addition, the sample was predominantly Christian, which may have influenced the observed associations,” Dempsey cautioned. “As religiosity can vary across cultural and social contexts, these findings may not generalize to more religiously diverse or less religious populations. Future research should therefore explore these relationships across different cultural and religious groups.”
There is also a possibility for misinterpretation regarding the content of the surveys. The private religious practices scale included meditation, which is a practice utilized in secular and spiritual contexts as well as religious ones. Future studies should separate meditation from explicitly religious actions to better understand what specifically drives the dampening of the stress response.
Additionally, while lower cardiovascular reactivity is generally seen as healthy, an unusually blunted physical response to stress can sometimes indicate negative health outcomes, such as depression or behavioral disengagement. The scientists suggest that more research is needed to fully understand when a muted stress response is adaptive and when it might be harmful.
Looking ahead, the researchers hope to build on these findings to better understand the distinct physical impacts of faith. “With regard to this research area, I hope to conduct longitudinal studies exploring different facets of religiosity and spirituality, including both positive and negative dimensions, across diverse cultural groups and age ranges,” Dempsey said.
The study, “Examining the associations between private religious practices, daily spiritual experiences, and cardiovascular stress reactivity,” was authored by Ailbhe Dempsey, Siobhán Howard, and Stephen Gallagher. The research was supported by Taighde Éireann and the National Institute on Aging.
-------------------------------------------------
DAILY EMAIL DIGEST: Email [email protected] -- no subject or message needed.
Private, vetted email list for mental health professionals: https://www.clinicians-exchange.org
Unofficial Psychology Today Xitter to toot feed at Psych Today Unofficial Bot @PTUnofficialBot
NYU Information for Practice puts out 400-500 good quality health-related research posts per week but its too much for many people, so that bot is limited to just subscribers. You can read it or subscribe at @PsychResearchBot
Since 1991 The National Psychologist has focused on keeping practicing psychologists current with news, information and items of interest. Check them out for more free articles, resources, and subscription information: https://www.nationalpsychologist.com
EMAIL DAILY DIGEST OF RSS FEEDS -- SUBSCRIBE: http://subscribe-article-digests.clinicians-exchange.org
READ ONLINE: http://read-the-rss-mega-archive.clinicians-exchange.org
It's primitive... but it works... mostly...
-------------------------------------------------
#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #PrivateReligiousPractices #PrayerAndStress #CardiovascularHealth #BloodPressureReactivity #ReligiosityVsSpirituality #StressManagement #HealthPsychology #MentalCopingStrategies #FaithAndWellness #CardioResearch
-
Socio-economic factors impact vulnerability to and burden of heat- and cold-related mortality in Europe
Masselot, P. et al. Estimating future heat-related and cold-related mortality under climate change, demographic and adaptation scenarios in…
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https://www.europesays.com/uk/931638/ Reduced symptom reporting quality during human–chatbot versus human–physician interactions #general #Health #HealthEconomics #HealthHumanities #HealthPromotionAndDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #HealthServices #Healthcare #HumanBehaviour #MaternalAndChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #UK #UnitedKingdom
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Reduced symptom reporting quality during human–chatbot versus human–physician interactions
Healthcare is undergoing a digital transformation characterized by the rapid integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and telemedicine platfor…
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https://www.newsbeep.com/ca/641399/ -
Reduced symptom reporting quality during human–chatbot versus human–physician interactions
Healthcare is undergoing a digital transformation characterized by the rapid integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and telemedicine plat…
#NewsBeep #News #Healthcare #AU #Australia #general #Health #healtheconomics #Healthhumanities #HealthPromotionandDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #healthservices #Humanbehaviour #MaternalandChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth
https://www.newsbeep.com/au/643364/ -
Reduced symptom reporting quality during human–chatbot versus human–physician interactions
Healthcare is undergoing a digital transformation characterized by the rapid integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and telemedicine plat…
#NewsBeep #News #Healthcare #AU #Australia #general #Health #healtheconomics #Healthhumanities #HealthPromotionandDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #healthservices #Humanbehaviour #MaternalandChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth
https://www.newsbeep.com/au/643364/ -
https://www.europesays.com/ie/463626/ Reduced symptom reporting quality during human–chatbot versus human–physician interactions #Éire #general #Health #HealthCare #HealthEconomics #HealthHumanities #HealthPromotionAndDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #HealthServices #Healthcare #HumanBehaviour #IE #Ireland #MaternalAndChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth
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https://www.europesays.com/ie/454269/ Mobile phone data show spatial and socioeconomic inequalities in hospital utilization #Éire #general #Health #HealthCare #HealthEconomics #HealthPolicy #HealthPromotionAndDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #Healthcare #IE #Ireland #MaternalAndChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #SocialSciences #Sociology
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Benefit of physical activity initiatives for climate change mitigation and adaptation
Overview This paper integrates evidence from multiple sources to explore the intersection of physical activity and climate change.…
#NewsBeep #News #Environment #CA #Canada #Environmentalstudies #general #healtheconomics #HealthPromotionandDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #MaternalandChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #Riskfactors #Science #Socialsciences
https://www.newsbeep.com/ca/525582/ -
Benefit of physical activity initiatives for climate change mitigation and adaptation
Overview This paper integrates evidence from multiple sources to explore the intersection of physical activity and climate change.…
#NewsBeep #News #Environment #AU #Australia #Environmentalstudies #general #healtheconomics #HealthPromotionandDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #MaternalandChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #Riskfactors #Science #Socialsciences
https://www.newsbeep.com/au/529823/ -
Benefit of physical activity initiatives for climate change mitigation and adaptation
Overview This paper integrates evidence from multiple sources to explore the intersection of physical activity and climate change.…
#NewsBeep #News #Environment #AU #Australia #Environmentalstudies #general #healtheconomics #HealthPromotionandDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #MaternalandChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #Riskfactors #Science #Socialsciences
https://www.newsbeep.com/au/529823/ -
Benefit of physical activity initiatives for climate change mitigation and adaptation
Overview This paper integrates evidence from multiple sources to explore the intersection of physical activity and climate change.…
#NewsBeep #News #Environment #AU #Australia #Environmentalstudies #general #healtheconomics #HealthPromotionandDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #MaternalandChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #Riskfactors #Science #Socialsciences
https://www.newsbeep.com/au/529823/ -
https://www.europesays.com/uk/815433/ Benefit of physical activity initiatives for climate change mitigation and adaptation #Environment #EnvironmentalStudies #general #HealthEconomics #HealthPromotionAndDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #MaternalAndChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #RiskFactors #Science #SocialSciences #UK #UnitedKingdom
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Benefit of physical activity initiatives for climate change mitigation and adaptation
Overview This paper integrates evidence from multiple sources to explore the intersection of physical activity an…
#NewsBeep #News #US #USA #UnitedStates #UnitedStatesOfAmerica #Environment #Environmentalstudies #general #healtheconomics #HealthPromotionandDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #MaternalandChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #Riskfactors #Science #Socialsciences
https://www.newsbeep.com/us/513888/ -
Benefit of physical activity initiatives for climate change mitigation and adaptation
Overview This paper integrates evidence from multiple sources to explore the intersection of physical activity an…
#NewsBeep #News #US #USA #UnitedStates #UnitedStatesOfAmerica #Environment #Environmentalstudies #general #healtheconomics #HealthPromotionandDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #MaternalandChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #Riskfactors #Science #Socialsciences
https://www.newsbeep.com/us/513888/ -
https://www.europesays.com/ie/376668/ Benefit of physical activity initiatives for climate change mitigation and adaptation #Éire #Environment #EnvironmentalStudies #general #HealthEconomics #HealthPromotionAndDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #IE #Ireland #MaternalAndChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #RiskFactors #Science #SocialSciences
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Geospatial insights of health vulnerability during the Ukraine war https://www.byteseu.com/1794142/ #Conflicts #General #HealthEconomics #HealthHumanities #HealthPromotionAndDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #MaternalAndChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #RiskFactors
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Thank you to #HealthPsychology and Behavioral Medicine @unibern for writing a post about the recent Summer Course 2025, “Contemporary Evaluation of Interventions: Mobile, Digital, and Pragmatic”
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gesundheitspsychologie-und-verhaltensmedizin-gpv-unibe_gpv-unibe-mhealth-activity-7340302148112408577-4_JW/ -
Thank you to #HealthPsychology and Behavioral Medicine @unibern for writing a post about the recent Summer Course 2025, “Contemporary Evaluation of Interventions: Mobile, Digital, and Pragmatic”
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gesundheitspsychologie-und-verhaltensmedizin-gpv-unibe_gpv-unibe-mhealth-activity-7340302148112408577-4_JW/ -
Thank you to #HealthPsychology and Behavioral Medicine @unibern for writing a post about the recent Summer Course 2025, “Contemporary Evaluation of Interventions: Mobile, Digital, and Pragmatic”
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gesundheitspsychologie-und-verhaltensmedizin-gpv-unibe_gpv-unibe-mhealth-activity-7340302148112408577-4_JW/ -
Thank you to #HealthPsychology and Behavioral Medicine @unibern for writing a post about the recent Summer Course 2025, “Contemporary Evaluation of Interventions: Mobile, Digital, and Pragmatic”
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gesundheitspsychologie-und-verhaltensmedizin-gpv-unibe_gpv-unibe-mhealth-activity-7340302148112408577-4_JW/ -
Thank you to #HealthPsychology and Behavioral Medicine @unibern for writing a post about the recent Summer Course 2025, “Contemporary Evaluation of Interventions: Mobile, Digital, and Pragmatic”
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gesundheitspsychologie-und-verhaltensmedizin-gpv-unibe_gpv-unibe-mhealth-activity-7340302148112408577-4_JW/ -
https://www.europesays.com/uk/820073/ Safety of a large language model-based clinical decision support system in African primary healthcare #Diagnosis #general #Health #HealthEconomics #HealthPromotionAndDiseasePrevention #HealthPsychology #HealthServices #Healthcare #MaternalAndChildHealth #Medicine/PublicHealth #UK #UnitedKingdom
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Our latest preprint validates two low-cost global #risk reduction stimuli .
An infographic and a text message improved #antibiotic decisions in ways that could reduce existential risks of #AntimicrobialResistance.
https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/d2pc4_v1
Oilivia Parlow was a great advisee!
#AMR #xRisk #CogSci #Medicine #Edu #SciComm #GlobalHealth #bioethics #HealthPsychology #HealthEconomics #Pharmacy #CollectiveAction #nudge
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Sharing new findings from a study I helped co-author on health behavior changes associated with psychedelic-use in naturalistic settings.
Participants retrospectively assessed changes in behaviors following experiences using psychedelics and frequently reported reduced alcohol (66%) and tobacco (49%) use, improved dietary habits (49%), and decreases in a range of impulsive behaviors (48–72%). https://authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S2211-3355(25)00200-1 #Psychedelics #PsychedelicScience #BehavioralMedicine #HealthPsychology
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Moved from .social, so an intro is due:
Teddy, thirty-something on my way to becoming a clinical psychologist and not what my mother dearest would want me to become
#jævlautlending in Norway, very gay and trying to live #green
I play American #football, go to the #gym for #therapy, and my #bicycle is electric and very speedy. My #dog has a personality of a middle-aged white man, but I still love him
My interests include #healthpsychology #behavioralmedicine #rehabilitation #pain
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Happy to share a new paper, just published online today in #DigitalHealth! A comprehensive review and content analysis of #ActiveVideoGame interventions. The result of a nearly 2 year collaboration attempting to summarize key features of 232 longitudinal health intervention studies that prominently featured AVG technology (≥50% of the intervention) #BehavioralMedicine #HealthPsychology https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/20552076231171232
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Question: Have you seen any good static infographics communicating current COVID-19 risk or vulnerability (e.g. risk groups, exposure, severity)? I'm specifically *not* looking for pandemic visuals.
If you have examples, please share links. 🙏
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Not really #newtomasodon, but back because *gestures at the birdsite*. What did I miss? Are more #digitalhealth/ #healthpsychology/ #publichealth people here now?
Quite a few things have happened in the past months, so will post a few updates in the next days.
#academicmastodon -
I am honored to join the group of editorial fellows at Health Psychology, the official journal of the Society for Health Psychology (Division 38; APA Publishing)
The editorial team, led by editor-in-chief John Ruiz, is comprised of a talented and diverse group of associate editors and editorial fellows. Learn about our group here.
#healthpsychology #health #psychology #publishing #society #medicine
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We share a set of free specific resources about #climatechange for #HealthPsychology
We can update this file, 🙏 share your ressources with us
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We published #nof1 examining a personalized #Behaviourchange intervention to increase #Physicalactivity
#OpenScience
#BehavioralScience
#HealthPsychology
#research
#academia🔓 postprint : https://link.infini.fr/vhDQn_Bn
🔓 data, code, intervention content : https://osf.io/zbxdm/ -
A new batch of people seem to have arrived at Mastodon :mastodon:. Welcome! 👋
To get you started with accounts to follow, two lists I know of:
If you're interested in #OpenScience, check out https://germanrepro.github.io/Mastodon-OpenScience/ by @rmrahal
If you're interested in #HealthPsychology and #BehaviorChange, check out https://hpss.one/mastodon.html
For more lists, see https://github.com/nathanlesage/academics-on-mastodon (anybody know of lists about methodology: qual, quant, evidence synthesis, measurement? 🤔)
[Boosts would be great, thanks! 🙏]
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Our protocol is out :vegan:
A 6-month pilot #digital #Behaviourchange intervention promoting a more environmentally #sustainable #healthy #diet
Text msg + brief, individualized, web-based feedback sessions
Inclusion criteria using the subjective #socioeconomic level
https://www.researchprotocols.org/2023/1/e41443/
#nof1 #vegan #Barcelona #Spain #PlanetaryHealth #healthpsychology
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Two associate professor positions in #healthpsychology and @clinicalpsychology are open at the @NantesUniv this year. Interested in applying for a position in a dynamic team, in an ideal living environment ? Then prepare your CV: ) https://www.galaxie.enseignementsup-recherche.gouv.fr/ensup/ListesPostesPublies/ANTEE/2023_1/0442953W/FOPC_0442953W_83.pdf https://www.galaxie.enseignementsup-recherche.gouv.fr/ensup/ListesPostesPublies/ANTEE/2023_1/0442953W/FOPC_0442953W_90.pdf
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Another scale translated into Serbian for the #Reason4Health research project is now openly available!
Magical Beliefs About Food and Health Scale: https://osf.io/vcs3d/
#REPOPSI is an #OpenAccess repository of psychological instruments at LIRA – Laboratory for Research of Individual Differences (Uni Belgrade).
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#REPOPSI – the open repository of psychological instruments at LIRA Laboratory for Research of Individual Differences (Uni Belgrade) – is now at 180 instruments! 94 are available in both Serbian & English.
180th scale measures attitude towards Traditional, Complementary & Alternative Medicine: https://osf.io/h8fsp/
It consists of 4 items & was developed by the #Reason4Health Research Team https://reasonforhealth.f.bg.ac.rs/en/Thanks everyone for this milestone!
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@healthpsychologists Health Psychologists and others interested in #HealthPsychology!
There's now a list of Mastodon accounts of Health Psychologists! 💫
You can also add yourself to the list, easily follow everybody, or follow a selection of people 🤩
The list is at https://hpss.one/mastodon.html ✨
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Such an impactful title/finding!
"Those Who Do Not Vaccinate Don't Love Themselves, Or Anyone Else": A Qualitative Study of Views and Attitudes of Urban Pregnant Women Towards Maternal Immunisation in Panama
By Clarissa Simas, Heidi J Larson, Pauline Paterson
Open-Access Article: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2020-044903
Found out about it in The Communication Initiative December newsletter: https://www.comminit.com/health/content/those-who-do-not-vaccinate-dont-love-themselves-or-anyone-else-qualitative-study-views-a
#Vaccination #QualitativeResearch #HealthPsychology #VaccinationCommunication
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How to use behavioural reward to get behaviour intention, a push toward implementation, and to discourage relapse through loss.
Environmentalists and doomers, consider your communication options.
#BehaviourChange #SciCom #EnvironmentalComms #Communication #Smoking #HealthPsychology
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I am an emeritus professor of #Healthpsychology based at Univ. of #Groningen & Univ. of #Twente, The #Netherlands. Toot (also in Dutch) on #coping with #chronic #disease #psychological #interventions, #ehealth #sustainability & #positive #vibes & more.
See: https://www.rug.nl/staff/r.sanderman/
Former President European Health Psychology Society https://ehps.net/
Currently President #Dutch Society #Psychosocial #Oncology https://nvpo.nl/
Co-founder Open Digital Health https://opendigitalhealth.org/ -
Hi there, here a short intro:
I am a behavioral scientist interested in #healthpsychology, #socialpsychology and #gerontology working at the MSB Medical School Berlin.
Currently, we are working on
- projects to increase #physicalactivity 🤸
- on understanding how the provision of #socialsupport can be beneficial or even healthy for support providers 🤗
- as well as #ViewsOnAging in the German population 👀
I am more and more interested in #environmentalpsychology, too. -
Hi there, here a short intro:
I am a behavioral scientist interested in #healthpsychology, #socialpsychology and #gerontology working at the MSB Medical School Berlin.
Currently, we are working on
- projects to increase #physicalactivity 🤸
- on understanding how the provision of #socialsupport can be beneficial or even healthy for support providers 🤗
- as well as #ViewsOnAging in the German population 👀
I am more and more interested in #environmentalpsychology, too. -
Hey #psychology #healthpsychology #behaviouralscience people - if your home academic society hosted a mastodon instance would the local timeline for the society mastodon instance be useful enough to make you migrate to that instance? Please reply if you've got thoughts about the concerns this would raise.
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#introduction
Hello! Just moved my account in sciences.social after discovering a bit more of the #fediverse
I'm a student in #psychology and I just started my Master in #healthpsychology
I'll probably follow people talking about psychology (obviously!) and science in general, but I also love #art #comics #books and a ton of other stuff :) -
Sharing new findings from a study I helped co-author on health behavior changes associated with psychedelic-use in naturalistic settings.
Participants retrospectively assessed changes in behaviors following experiences using psychedelics and frequently reported reduced alcohol (66%) and tobacco (49%) use, improved dietary habits (49%), and decreases in a range of impulsive behaviors (48–72%). https://authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S2211-3355(25)00200-1 #Psychedelics #PsychedelicScience #BehavioralMedicine #HealthPsychology
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Sharing new findings from a study I helped co-author on health behavior changes associated with psychedelic-use in naturalistic settings.
Participants retrospectively assessed changes in behaviors following experiences using psychedelics and frequently reported reduced alcohol (66%) and tobacco (49%) use, improved dietary habits (49%), and decreases in a range of impulsive behaviors (48–72%). https://authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S2211-3355(25)00200-1 #Psychedelics #PsychedelicScience #BehavioralMedicine #HealthPsychology