Tis Better to Give Than to Receive? Life Scientists Find That Giving Support Offers Health Benefits -- To the Giver

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/11/111109152213.htm

ScienceDaily (Nov. 9, 2011) — Providing support to a loved one offers benefits to the giver, not just the recipient, a new brain-imaging study by UCLA life scientists reveals.

"When people talk about the ways in which social support is good for our health, they typically assume that the benefits of social support come from the support we receive from others, but it now seems likely that some of the health benefits of social support actually come from the support we provide to others," said Naomi Eisenberger, a UCLA assistant professor of psychology and the senior author of the study, published in the online edition of Psychosomatic Medicine, a peer-reviewed health psychology journal.

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The life scientists found that when women gave support to their boyfriends in pain, the women showed increased activity in reward-related regions of the brain, including the ventral striatum and septal area. In addition, the more reward-related neural activity these women showed, the more connected they reported feeling with their boyfriends while providing support. Under conditions in which no support was provided, these regions showed decreased activity.

"One of these regions, the ventral striatum, is typically active in response to simple rewards like chocolate, sex and money," Eisenberger said. "The fact that support-giving also activates this region suggests that support-giving may be processed by the brain as a very basic type of rewarding experience."

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