BEING NICE......................Thunderhead

The High of Being Nice

Psychologists have long wondered what motivates people to be nice. Now reseachers at Emory University have found that cooperating with another person activates the pleasure centers of the brain, the same parts that are stimulated by rewards like food or money.

The scientists used magnetic resonance imaging to scan the brains of 36 women while they played the "Prisoner's Dilemma Game," a decades-old model for conflict and cooperation. Two players independently chose to either band together for defect. If they cooperated, they each earned $2, if both defected, each got $1. But if one cooperated and one defected, the defector was paid $3 and the cooperator got nothing. The researchers found that most of the time the women chose to cooperate. Whenever they did work together, the scientists could see stimulation in two parts of the brain associated with pleasure. "This suggests that people find it rewarding to cooperate with each other," says neuroscientist Gregory Berns, Mutual small acts of kindness really do make you feel better...(and when you feel better, you are healthier....:-)

...And this explains the addiction behind USM...Don't ya love it?

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