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July 12, 2010
Sadness, Happiness May Spread Like Infectious Diseases.
The Los Angeles Times (7/8, Bernstein) "Booster Shots" blog reported that, according to a paper in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, emotions "appear to spread like" an infectious disease. Harvard and MIT scientists had "wanted to see if a mathematical model developed to track and predict the spread of infectious diseases such as SARS and foot-and-mouth disease could also apply to the spread of happiness -- and found that it worked."
Using data "collected from 1,880 subjects in the Framingham Heart Study," investigators eventually observed a "correlation between an individual's emotional state and those of the person's contacts."
Related Links:
- How are sadness and happiness like diseases? They're infectious, study finds," Rachel Bernstein, Los Angeles Times: Booster Shots Blog, July 8, 2010.
Posted by admin at July 12, 2010 04:31 PM