Abstract
M.Phil.
Everybody wants to experience happiness, prosperity and good health. Today's
demands and pressures make it very difficult to experience well-being in our
work environment and personal life. Symptoms like stress, negative attitude,
depression, aggression and low productivity are visible. All these symptoms
have an influence on the human body and emotions. Psychosomatic illnesses
like depression, stress, heart disease, high blood pressure, asthma and back
and shoulder pains are common phenomena. The question is what can a
person do, in spite of the circumstances, to achieve personal well-being and
healthiness. The aim of this study is to investigate the influence of some
emotions on personal well-being, specifically the influence of stress as an
unhealthy emotion and laughter and humor as healthy emotions. The specific
research questions are:
1. What is the effect of stress, as an unhealthy emotion, on a human's wellbeing?
2. What is the effect of laughter and humor, as healthy emotions, on a
human's well-being?
3. What are the benefits that laughter and humor, as healthy emotions, have
for personal wellbeing and healthiness?
The research programme entails the following: Chapter one gives a general
orientation of the study. The second chapter focuses on the influence of stress
as an unhealthy emotion on personal well-being while chapter three deals with
the influence of laughter and humor as healthy emotions on personal well-being.
In chapter four the characteristics of a personal and professional leader as well
as the main life domains are investigated. Chapter five concludes the research
with a summary, findings and conclusion.
2. METHOD OF APPROACH
A descriptive research strategy was followed in this study. A descriptive
research study is a systematic, accurate and factual description of something, in
this case the influence of some emotions on personal well-being, for the sake of
better understanding, insight and informativeness (Smith, 1993:35). The
prevalent research methods used were studies of existing literature available in
this field as well as concept and phenomena analyses.
3. RESEARCH FINDINGS
The research findings are as follows:
Stress has a physiological and a psychological influence on the human body
and has been shown to affect almost all body systems, resulting in
cardiovascular disease, neuromuscular disorders (including migraine and
chronic back pain}, respiratory and allergic disorders, immunologic disorders,
gastrointestinal disturbances (including peptic ulcer disease, irritable bowel
syndrome, nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea), skin disease, dental problems, and
a host of other disorders (Hafen, 1996:44).
Laughter and humor have, because of the physiological changes that take
place, a big impact in terms of physical benefits (including respiratory activity,
oxygen exchange, heartrate, and toning the cardiovascular system), pain relief,
(arthritis, gout, back and shoulder pain), immunity-enhancing and psychological
benefits (stress relieve, bestowing a sense of power, giving new perspective).
By applying specific suggestions how to use laughter and humor as healthy
emotions from a Personal and Professional Perspective it is possible to achieve
personal well-being and healthiness.