Today's teenagers find it hard to believe, but there was a time when photos were not taken using a mobile phone, films were watched on TV, and at best they bought a VCR. Today, nostalgia is considered to be a bittersweet longing for bygone days. Researchers believe that nostalgia can promote mental health by awakening positive feelings and also help maintain emotional balance. But what else does science know about nostalgia?
Who Said Nostalgia Is A Brain Disease?
Literally, nostalgia is suffering caused by an unsatisfied desire to return home. The first case in literature occurs in Homer's Odyssey, which tells of Ulysses' return to Ithaca after the Trojan War. But a similar condition was first described in 1688, when the Swiss physician Johannes Hofer used the term to describe the homesickness taken by the soldiers of his country. Among the physical and psychological symptoms they experienced were tachycardia, crying attacks, insomnia, and fear. Consequently, Hofer defined nostalgia as "a neurological disease arising from demonic causes." This theory has been challenged by other experts who linked the defeat of the Swiss soldiers to changes in atmospheric pressure after they were transferred from mountain villages to the plains. There were even those who speculated that the continuous sound of cow bells in the Alps damaged the eardrum and brains of these concerned people.
And yet, until the nineteenth century, nostalgia, thanks to Hofer, was interpreted as a disease of the brain. It has been described as a pathological form of melancholy or a kind of immigrant psychosis, that is, a mental disorder that causes unbridled sadness and disrupts the thinking of those who wish to return home after a long absence. These theories persisted until 1979, when American sociologist Fred Davis (1925-1993) described nostalgia as a sentimental longing for people, places, or situations that made us happy in the past. Thus, he established the modern definition of nostalgia. Since then, many scientific studies have tried to show that it is not only a negative mood, but also a well-being that gives meaning to our lives.
Nostalgia makes us feel better
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According to The New York Times, an international team of researchers from the University of Southampton, England, analyzed the methodological stories of different people collected in the laboratory and magazine Nostalgia, which reflected everyday life in the United States in the 50-60s. Research has shown that in most cases, the protagonist of memories is the person himself. But most of all, scientists were struck by the frequency with which people imagined what scientists called a sequence of improvements: nostalgic stories often start badly, with a description of a problem, but then all problems are solved with the help of someone close to the protagonist. Eventually the hero experiences a sense of belonging and becomes more generous towards others. The opposite rarely happened when the story ended badly. As a result, the researchers came to the conclusion thatthat nostalgia helps to resist loneliness, boredom and anxiety. Nostalgia not only promotes emotional balance in the face of negative thoughts and situations, but also helps to cope with the inevitable fact of our own death.
Who shouldn't indulge in nostalgia?
Memories of childhood highlights, such as the image of a mother preparing a favorite meal, or the day a pet appears in the house can help cheer you up. Yet nostalgia can have a negative impact on some people. According to a study by psychologists from the University of Miami (USA), such memories make people suffering from depression even more sad. The reason is that they do not experience the coherence between the positive self in their memories and the negative perception of themselves in the present moment.
Where is nostalgia born in the brain?
In an experiment at Tilburg University in the south of the Netherlands, social and behavioral science expert Ed Wingerhoets found that some songs make people not only feel nostalgic, but also feel warmer. After following a group of students for a month, Xinyue Zhou, a professor at Sun Yatsen University in China, found that nostalgic moods are more common on cold days. For example, people who are in a cold room are more likely to experience memories than those who are in a warm room. This connection between body and mind leads scientists to think that nostalgia may have had an evolutionary value to our ancestors, prompting them to constantly seek shelter and food in order to survive. There is no doubt that this psychological phenomenon occurs in the brain, but where exactly?
Modern neuroimaging techniques have helped answer this question. In an experiment, the Japanese scientist Kentaro Oba decided to find out which areas of the brain are active when viewing children's photographs. Activity was observed in the hippocampus, the region of the brain responsible for storing memories, and in the ventral striatum, the region responsible for feelings of reward. It turns out that indulging in nostalgia is useful and pleasant, but not if you have been diagnosed with depression and anxiety disorder.
Lyubov Sokovikova
