People are always giving out about how stressful modern life is, with various ailments, depression, chronic pain, insomnia, all seen as modern probelsm, with modern causes. Especially when it comes to giving out about "technology" and "progress".
Maybe we were better of living in the jungle? Sure we wouldn't have our wide screen tv, but we would be happy and stress free?
Not accoring to this latest study! I find myself in total agreement with thsiarticle, as I can't stand it when people wax lyrical about the "simpler times", or "the good old days".
http://www.aftenposten.no/english/lo...ticleID=624177
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Jungle dwelling is more stressful life
The indigenous Mangyan people of the Mindoro Island in the Phillipines live a traditional and primitive life on the edge of the tropical jungle. Norwegian researchers have now found that the Mangyan way of life produces the same types of stress that modern technological living does - only more so.
Brit Hellesnes, chief physiotherapist at the heart and lung center at Ullevaal Hospital, and her husband, Peer Staff, head of medical expertise at Vesta Insurance, decided to take a close look at the difference between basic living and the well-documented strains of modern existence.
A year ago, the couple traveled to Mindoro and carried out extensive interviews with local interpreters. The results were unexpected, and will be published in an international scholarly journal later this year.
"We were greatly surprised when the data was analyzed and we found that, not only did the jungle dwellers have the same ailments we did, they had them to an even greater degree. Also, we found that the distribution of ailments was exactly like that in modern society," Staff and Hellesnes said.
Fatigue, depression, sleeplessness are all common complaints that are not solved by a hunter-gatherer lifestyle grounded by some basic agriculture.
Like present-day affluent Norwegians, the most common physical complaints were muscle and skeletal pains. But while 82.1 percent of Norwegians answered that they have had such problems in the course of the past 30 days, 100 percent of the Mindoro felt the same.
Stomach ailments pestered 60 percent of Norwegians during the previous month - over 80 percent of the Mindoro had the same complaint.
The lack of control over their existence gave the Mindoro far more to worry about, and even such basic elements like food or childbirth are laden with uncertainty on the fringe of the jungle. A basic difference between the two varying cultures is that the Mindoro do not view their pains as illnesses, but rather as a normal state of affairs.
The researchers pointed out that Norwegians also did not consider such afflictions to be illnesses until relatively recently, and place some of the blame on the World Health Organization for defining health as the absence of ailments.
The result has been the evolution of a society that is never quite in form, and a tendency to focus on and use minor ailments for relief.
"Many of our diffuse ailments are strengthened because society does not allow enough daily breathing room. Instead we have to use these 'pains' to get ourselves a break," the researchers said.
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STRESS SYMPTOMS
Joint and muscle pain, fatigue.
Stomach pain, loose bowels or constipation, gas, nausea.
Exhaustion after minor physical or mental exertion.
Dizziness with no distinct cause.
Chest pain, difficult breathing.
Difficulty concentrating, memory lapses.
Source: The Journal of the Norwegian Medical Association
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