Kindness in the Blood: How Helping Others Reduces Inflammation
Studies now show that being kind to people causes genetic effects in immune cells.
Kindness is more than something that you do. It’s also an experience you have – whether you’re the giver of kindness, the receiver, or even if you witness it or just hear about it second hand.
And that experience brings about crucially important effects in your brain and throughout your body. Here, I’d like to describe some groundbreaking research showing that kindness impacts the genetic activity of circulating immune cells in the bloodstream.
A Randomised Controlled Trial
In 2022, researchers at The University of California, Riverside, and UCLA randomised 182 people into three groups.
They asked one group to do three acts of kindness for other people on one day of the week, each week for four weeks. They asked another group to do three kind things for themselves on one day of each week for four weeks. And the third group were simply asked to list daily activities on one day of the week for four weeks – for comparison.
Blood samples were taken from the volunteers at the beginning and a week after the four weeks.
Incredibly, being kind to others had impacted the genetic activity in circulating immune cells (leukocytes – white blood cells) in the bloodstream.
More precisely, activity was reduced in a set of genes known as CTRA (Conserved Transcriptional Response to Adversity). A conserved transcriptional response to adversity typically means increased inflammation and reduced innate antiviral activity. Thus, the reduced activity in these CTRA genes meant a reduction in inflammation and a bolstering of natural antiviral activity.
Personally, I find this incredible. Although not surprising. I’ve written four books on the science-backed effects of kindness on the brain and body. Kindness causes physical effects on our arteries, heart, nervous system, gut, even key brain networks.
But this research takes things a stage further.
As I said, kindness is more than something that you do. It’s also an experience you have, and one that causes significantly important effects in the body.
Why?
Nature’s Reward
I think of effects like these as nature’s reward. You see, we have kind genes – that is, genes involved in the human tendency to care – to have empathy and express that empathy in kind words or actions. They’re some of the oldest in the human genome – at least 100 million years old, although their roots go back much farther.
The fact we still have these genes after all this time tells us that kind and caring behaviours are crucial for our survival and the flourishing of the human species.
We’re supposed to be kind. When we’re not kind, we spare ourselves from this and some other remarkable effects.
Saying this, in the group who were asked to do kind things for themselves, this is not to say that self-kindness, or self-care, isn’t beneficial. Because of course it is.
Self-kindness, however, tends to have its more significant effects on mental wellbeing and by helping to relax the nervous system.
It’s just that kindness to others has particularly unique effects on the immune system – as well as the brain and cardiovascular system.
Why?
As I said, Nature’s reward! We have evolved so that kindness impacts systems that play a significantly important role in survival and flourishing – like on the immune system.
We all survive and flourish better when we help each other out. People. Businesses. Countries. Cultures.
We’re supposed to be kind. It’s who we are. Kind is what we are.
Kind is how we make life that bit sweeter in the lives of those around us. It can transform relationships. It benefits households, communities, classrooms. It improves the culture in businesses. It’s what would make politics fairer and less adversarial.
Heck, being kind is how we can change the world.
One kind act at a time.
Want a video version of this study?
Watch my YouTube summary of the research.
Thank you David for sharing this research, your excellent commentary, and the indescribably important work you perform to spread awareness of the evidence-based transformative power of kindness. You are an inspiration!
Given the positive effects of kindness on reducing inflammation and boosting our immune system, as well as lowering blood pressure, slowing aging, improving sleep, and relaxing our nervous systems, I wonder how much more evidence is required before physicians begin prescribing their patients selfless acts of kindness to improve their health. Imagine that instead of a doctor prescribing their patient a daily pill, that they prescribe them a daily act of selfless kindness. Imagine the positive effects on our world!
Of course, doctors are going to want more data. Hence, I wonder about the status of prospective phase III randomized confirmatory trials involving many thousands of participants. I wonder about potential studies of the emotional, physiological, and overall health status of people who self-identify as routinely practicing selfless kindness compared to those who self-identify as not. For example, controlling for factors such as age, do those who practice kindness have lower incidences of major diseases?
Who would fund such studies? The NIH in the US is under extreme pressure at the moment. How about the NIHR in Britain? Is anyone submitting grants for these kind of large-scale studies?
Our world needs kindness more than ever but skeptical minds need data. If kindness is as powerful as we believe, it is vitally important that we acquire that data as soon as possible. What is the path forward?