By Tonia Callender, GWI research fellow We are grappling with increasingly severe global crises that threaten our health and wellbeing. The Global Wellness Institute continues to champion the adoption of wellness practices, preventive approaches and healthy lifestyles to counter these threats. In its earlier report, “Defining Wellness Policy,” GWI introduced wellness policy and sparked a global conversation about how we can use it to improve our wellbeing. But what is wellness policy and why is it important? In this edition of the Brief, we define it and outline how it can benefit our communities. READ MORE
The new interdisciplinary field of neuroaesthetics explains why engaging with beauty via the arts or nature has such a profound impact on health. Susan Magsamen, co-author of Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us, and founder of the International Arts + Mind Lab at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, said: “Arts and aesthetic experiences are essential to the human condition.” While we all have different ideas about beauty, neuroaesthetics research is unriddling how beauty impacts the brain, from lowering the activation of the stress-related amygdala, to moving us into our parasympathetic “rest and digest” state. Beauty is the goliath industry in wellness (the market helping people look good), but Malleret argues that helping people experience all types of beauty should be a bigger wellness industry focus––a pillar, like exercise and healthy nutrition.
University of Sydney researchers, analyzing data from 103,000 people that used a fitness tracker for years, found that just 1.5- to 4-minute bursts of daily high intensity exercise (whether taking the stairs instead of the elevator or carrying groceries) dramatically lowered risk of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE). The impact was much greater on women than men: 3.4 minutes of intense bouts of exercise per day lowered MACE risk by 45% in women and 16% in men. Women with no exercise regimen who recorded 3.4 minutes a day were 51% less likely to have a heart attack and had 67% decreased risk for heart failure. ACCESS THIS STUDY on exercise.
TikTok’s annual carbon footprint is bigger than Greece’s. The average user generates greenhouse gases equal to driving an extra 123 miles in gas-powered car each year.
Source: Greenly, a Paris-based carbon accounting consultancy
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