Suppressing emotions has been considered detrimental to physical and mental health in the past, and recently scientists have found evidence that it causes shorter lifespans and susceptibility to tumors. The latest study, conducted jointly by the Harvard School of Public Health and the University of Rochester in the United States, shows that people who are always depressed have at least a 36 percent shorter life expectancy than those who are able to express their emotions accurately. When analyzing the specific causes in detail, the researchers found a 47 percent increased risk of heart disease and a 70 percent increased risk of tumors. The study, published in the Journal of Research in Mind-Body Medicine, reports that the consequences of repressed emotions are more serious than currently recognized. The study was an analysis of data from 796 subjects with an average age of 44 who had signed up for a health survey including a psychological questionnaire 12 years earlier. The researchers administered the same survey to the group 12 years later and found that 111 of the subjects had died – mostly from heart disease or cancer. After analyzing the subjects’ emotional scores, the researchers found that those who were most likely to suppress their anger without revealing their true thoughts had the highest mortality rates. The exact mechanism is unclear, possibly because people turn to alcohol, smoking and junk food in order to deal with hidden emotions that are harmful to the body. Another possibility is that negative emotions disrupt endocrine balance and determine immune resistance, which increases the risk of diseases associated with cellular damage such as heart disease and cancer. The study reports that these findings reveal the correlation between repressed emotions and the occurrence of certain diseases and death. Therefore, for health and longevity, people need to take care to learn to properly release stress and and regulate their emotions.