It may be that a simple change in perception can turn everyday housework into a great workout that improves the way a person's body looks, decreases weight and lowers blood pressure. No additional work required - just a change in how a person perceives what they are already doing.
Ellen Langer, a Harvard psychologist, performed a study of hotel maids that challenges how we traditionally view the mind-body connection.
The majority of the maids perception was that they did not exercise, even though in the course of their daily work they exceeded the surgeon general's recommendations for daily exercise. She also noted that their weight, blood pressure and body shape were not consistent with someone exercising daily.
She split the maids into two groups - one group had the exercise they were already getting, by doing their jobs, explained to them in terms of the health benefits it would provide - the other group continued to do their daily work with no additional information.
At the conclusion of the study she found a connection between the perception of exercise and increased health. The maids who perceived that what they were doing had health benefits exhibited those benefits in terms of lowered body mass index, decreased weight, lower blood pressure, and positive changes in body shape.
There are skeptics of course, but I think most people would agree that the mind-body connection is not well understood. We may end up finding the old saw - "perception is reality" has more merit than we have been led to believe.
The report mentions another study done by Howard Brody director of the Institute for the Medical Humanities at the University of Texas Medical Branch and the author of the book, The Placebo Response
: How You Can Release the Body's Inner Pharmacy for Better Health.In this study a group of patients with asthma were given a medication that makes asthma worse, but were told it would make it better. A significant number of patients reported their asthma got better and had measurably improved lung function.
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