How positive emotions build physical health: perceived positive social connections account for the upward spiral between positive emotions and vagal tone.
Psychological Science July 1, 2013 Bethany E Kok, Kimberly A. Coffey, Michael Cohn et al.
The mechanisms underlying the association between positive emotions and physical health remain a mystery. We hypothesize that an upward-spiral dynamic continually reinforces the tie between positive emotions and physical health and that this spiral is mediated by people's perceptions of their positive social connections. We tested this overarching hypothesis in a longitudinal field experiment...