Chiropractor Best Practices
Research Commentary;
Kindness Lowers Pain
Altruistic behaviors relieve physical pain
A review of
Wang, Tilu, Ge, Jianqiao, Zhang, Hanqi, et al. Altruistic behaviors relieve physical pain. PNAS. Dec. 30, 2019;117(2).950–958.
By Dr. Bryan Stephens
Summarized Review Conclusions
We consistently talk about how lowering stress aids in lowering pain and inflammation. Most of the time, we focus on how to calm our own minds through breathing, relaxation, meditation, prayer, and sleep. Another thing that can aid with our own health is showing kindness to others. There is a growing amount of literature showing the benefits we gain by helping others, but I wanted to start with this one as it has multiple experiments rolled into one. The best part, all 5 of them, including the two pilot studies, show that altruistic behaviors (kindness) lowered pain.
“Specifically, the altruistic group perceived less pain than the control group”
Wang, Tilu, Ge, Jianqiao, Zhang, Hanqi, et al. Altruistic behaviors relieve physical pain. PNAS. Dec. 30, 2019;117(2).950–958.
“This finding supports the notion of a pain-relieving effect of the precedent altruistic behaviors.”
Wang, Tilu, Ge, Jianqiao, Zhang, Hanqi, et al. Altruistic behaviors relieve physical pain. PNAS. Dec. 30, 2019;117(2).950–958.
“[altruistic] participants experienced a decline in pain across time…However, when the activities were performed for oneself, the pain-relieving effect was reduced by 62.5%.”
Wang, Tilu, Ge, Jianqiao, Zhang, Hanqi, et al. Altruistic behaviors relieve physical pain. PNAS. Dec. 30, 2019;117(2).950–958.
Introduction to the Research
While altruistic behaviors are applauded, they are actually difficult/harmful to the ones doing them. Take the act of donating money, it is giving away resources that could be helpful for bettering yourself. Yet as a group, we find ourselves more wiling to donate our time, food, money, etc. during times of crisis. We call it a kindness. These researchers looked at what the benefits are from these acts.
Research Methodology
Two pilot studies and 3 experiments were performed. The first pilot study looked at the pain levels of donating blood vs. having to give blood for tests. The second pilot study looked at the pain levels of submerging your hand in an ice bath between 3 groups. These groups were broken down to choosing to revise a handbook for children without pay (altruistic), declining the act (nonaltruistic), or making the act mandatory (control).
The first experiment performed a tourniquet pain test in which participants were randomly assigned to a group that did the test for a 10 yuan donation to earthquake victims vs. those that were paid 10 yuan themselves for the test.
Experiment 2 performed fMRI scans on the pain areas of the brain for people that either chose to donate money vs. a group deciding if two sets of shapes were the same.
Experiment 3 looked at cancer patients with chronic pain and compared overall pain levels to those doing a nutrition plan for the group vs. those doing the nutritional plan for themselves.
Research Findings
Pilot study 1 showed a decrease in pain for those donating blood over those giving blood for a normal test. This was true even through the needle was bigger and more blood was given for the donation than for the tests.
Pilot study 2 found that the altruistic group not only reported less pain, they also held their hand in the ice bath for longer periods of time
Experiment 1 showed similar results to the pilot study. The first tourniquet pain test performed between the two groups showed similar baselines. Once the altruistic group was made aware that they were doing the test to donate 10 yuan to earthquake victims, they reported less pain on the follow up test than the control group.
Seeing the pattern?
Experiment 2 showed that the altruistic group had significantly decreased activity in the areas of the brain associated with pain when given a shock.
Experiment 3 follows suit and showed the decrease in pain even applied to those dealing with chronic pain.
All of the studies and experiments had the correlation of decreased pain when associated with altruistic acts.
Research References
As always with these reviews, these are my takeaways from the article and I encourage you to read the article in its entirety. The references used in this article by the authors of this article are listed here.
Our Message
When you are looking for a Chiropractor near you that you can trust, choose one who will not only get rid of your back pain, neck pain, or headaches but who will also guide you to living a healthier lifestyle to keep you out of pain. Our Chiropractors located in St. Louis Park, near the corner of MN-100 S & Lake Rd./Westside Dr., will teach you what the research says about how and why we should eat a better diet, move more and have more positive thoughts. By improving these areas of our lives we can become healthier, stay out of pain and reduce risk of diabetes and other diseases!