I’ve previously written about how and why I have students regularly share stories with each other about positive events that happen in their lives, and why I encourage other students to ask questions about them (see The Value Of Sharing Positive Events).

To build on the studies I’ve cited in those posts, yet another one has re-enforced the importance of that practice:

a team of psychologists in the USA has performed a series of studies that suggest sharing your good news multiplies its benefits for your happiness and longer-term life satisfaction….

….The researchers found that sharing your good news with another person is especially beneficial, more than writing about it, and more than just enjoying social contact….

What this new study doesn’t tell us is why, when it is enthusiastically received, sharing our good news provides us with an extra dose of positive emotion, more than merely recalling it or writing about it. The researchers made a number of suggestions – for example, they said talking about a positive experience could increase its “social reality”, making it especially accessible to memory; friends may point out positive implications of our news that had so far eluded us; and/or we perhaps take extra joy in making another person happy through our good news.

I’m adding this post to My Best Posts On Why It’s Important To Be Positive In Class.