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To deal with stress you can opt for journalling. © Shutterstock
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It decreases depression: People diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorders showed a stark decrease in their depression scores in a four-week experiment when they practiced expressive writing. [1]
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It helps people with chronic worry: A 2017 study conducted on people who have chronic worry showed that there was decrease in their error-related negativity seen in people with anxiety disorder. [2]
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It can help those dependent on pills: Substance use disorder (SUD) refers to a person's overdependence on one or more types of drugs. When women with SUD were subjected to expressive writing exercises, there was a slight improvement in their condition, leading researchers to believe that expressive writing could be used along with other methods in the treatment of SUD. [3]
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It helps those with fear of math: Many people, especially women, have a fear of math called math anxiety. A study showed that expressive writing could boost the performance of students with math anxiety in math-testing situations. [4]
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It heals those with PTSD: Post traumatic stress disorder or PTSD is a debilitating mental condition, the effects of which can be altered to a significant extent with expressive writing. Study shows that depression, physiological response and recovery of patients reeling from traumatic experience improved after they wrote about their emotional state. It also helped in improving their mood and reducing cortisol reponse to their trauma-related memories. [5]
