In my book, 10 Essentials of Happy, Healthy People: Becoming and staying highly healthy, I discuss what I call the “four wheels of health”: physical, emotional, spiritual, and relational.

In the book I say, that relationships are so important to health, that people should “avoid loneliness like the plague.” Now, CBS Evening News is reporting, “Researchers at Brigham Young said today strong relationships can improve your chances of living longer by 50%.”
Time reported, “A healthy social life may be as good for your long-term health as avoiding cigarettes, according to a massive research review released Tuesday by the journal PLoS Medicine.” After examining “pooled data from 148 studies on health outcomes and social relationships — every research paper on the topic they could find, involving more than 300,000 men and women across the developed world,” researchers “found that those with poor social connections had on average 50% higher odds of death in the study’s follow-up period (an average of 7.5 years) than people with more robust social ties,” an increase in longevity comparable to that between smokers and non-smokers.
“It’s difficult to say why relationships matter so much to human health,” the Los Angeles Times “Booster Shots” blog reported. “It could be that people who are connected to others take better care of themselves, take fewer risks, or find more meaning to their lives.”
“Regardless of age, sex, initial health status, cause of death, and follow-up period in the individual studies, the new analysis finds that those with stronger relationships have an increased likelihood of survival,” the CNN “The Chart” blog reported.
If you’d like to learn more on improving your relationship health, pick up a copy of my 10 Essentials of Happy, Healthy People: Becoming and staying highly healthy.

And, for those of you who are married, consider reading together my and Barb’s book, His Brain, Her Brain: How divinely designed differences can strengthen your marriage.

Also, you can purchase these and my other autographed books here.