Yes, you read the headline correctly. New research has shown that parents, particularly mothers, have lower blood pressure than people who aren’t parents. Plus, blood pressure wasn’t affected by the number of kids or the ages of kids. So, two-year-old or 16-year-old, it’s all the same when it comes to blood pressure.
Are you surprised? Me too, a bit.
Yet, this is one of those “how interesting” studies. No doctor is going to tell you to have a kid to lower your blood pressure! You can do that with exercise and a diet low in sodium.
“This doesn’t mean the more kids you have, the better your blood pressure,” said Julianne Holt-Lunstad, a Brigham Young University psychologist who studies relationships and health. She said that the findings are linked with parenthood only, not the number of children or employment status.
According to Holt-Lunstad, even though caring for children can be stressful, deriving a sense of meaning and purpose from that stress is associated with better health. However, it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly why parents were found to have lower blood pressure. It could be a biological or social response.
The study involved 198 adults who wore portable blood pressure monitors for 24 hours. The age range of participants was 20 to 68 years, and 70% had children.
Through statistical analysis, researchers were able to account for other factors known to influence blood pressure: age, body mass, gender, exercise, employment and smoking. They zeroed in on the relationship between parenthood and blood pressure, and found it to be positive.
Overall, the 24-hour blood pressure readings for parents averaged 116 / 71. That’s 4.5 points lower than non-parents for systolic blood pressure (the first number). And it’s 3 points lower than non-parents in diastolic blood pressure. The difference is statistically significant. The findings were reported in journal Annals of Behavioral Medicine.
Why do you think parents in this study were found to have lower blood pressure than non-parents?
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Post from: Blisstree