The secret to a long life is actually pretty simple: Keep calm and active.
Recent research from the National Institute on Aging looking at the link between personality and life span shows some personality traits are definitively linked to a longer life, including emotional stability, organization, discipline, conscientiousness and resourcefulness. Certain other traits led to a shorter life: anger, emotional instability, anxiousness and depression, among them.
The findings came from data collected by the Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging, which has followed 2,300 people for more than 50 years, and were published in the July/August journal Psychosomatic Medicine.
This study is not new news. Most people know that happiness and an active lifestyle lead to good health. In a similar 2003 study, researchers found that men with “competitive, impatient, uptight” personalities had heart attacks earlier than those who did not have a Type A personality. The Sacramento Bee
