How Keeping Your Cool Could Help Your Heart

Here's some news that may send you back to that hated yoga class for some intensive deep breathing exercises. According to a study published Monday in Circulation, the journal of the American Heart Association, those among us who have what is diplomatically referred to as "a short fuse" are three times more likely to have a heart attack than are our more placid peers. And this isn't true only for rage that's combined with a pack-a-day smoking habit or a penchant for pastries, as the researchers were quick to point out. Even when other heart-battering behaviors were taken into account, a causative effect between anger and heart attacks was apparent during the course of the investigation, which took place over six years at the University of North CarolinaChapel Hill.

Doctors won't be surprised by the implications of this study, says TIME medical contributor Dr. Ian Smith. "For decades, physicians have suspected a link between anger and hostility — or what some consider 'type A' behaviors — and heart disease." But while anecdotal evidence supported their hunches, there was little scientific proof of any connection. Over the last several years, says Smith, that has started to change, as new, more convincing literature has begun to emerge on the topic. And the UNC study, adds Smith, which was painstakingly conducted, will add particular credence to the emotion-heart correlation. "This study will probably be referred back to in years to come as a defining moment in cardiac health," says Smith. "It was extremely well done, and included almost 13,000 subjects." In other words, it looks like your mother was right again: You should never go to bed angry.