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Forget
"fight or flight" as the only
duo of responses in the face of
stress. For women, there's a
third response: "befriend". A
landmark UCLA study turned five
decades of stress research on
its head with the revelation
that a cascade of brain
chemicals gives women a larger
behavioral repertoire when
confronted with stress.
The hormone
oxytocin is released as part of
the stress response in women. It
controls the fight/flight
response and, instead,
encourages her to tend children
and gather with other women.
According
to co-researcher Dr. Laura
Cousino Klein, now assistant
professor of bio-behavioral
health at Penn State, the study
suggests that this "tending and
befriending" response to
oxytocin produces a calming
effect. Although it will take
new studies to reveal all the
ways in which oxytocin
encourages women to care for
children and band together, it
might also explain why women
consistently outlive men.
I have
addressed numerous women's
conferences and corporate
networks of women and I can
attest to the observable
behavior that participants leave
these sessions feeling stronger,
encouraged, and positive. I
believe they also leave
healthier. The famed Nurses
Health Study from Harvard
Medical School found that the
more friends people have, they
less likely they are to develop physical
ailments and the more likely
they are to cope better with challenges.
Sadly,
today's busy agendas often find
women canceling the most
positive and healthy thing they
can do: gather with other women
to engage in
the kind of "rapport" and
"report" talk that hallmark
feminine conversations. The
corporate women's networks that
generate the most return for the
time and money investment allow for the
nuts-and-bolts training needed
for the business while also creating
plenty of opportunity for
mentoring, problem-solving and the
informal sharing of personal
issues.
Create a
gathering of women and stand
back. The energy reborn from
conversation, caring, compassion
and concern can move a
community, a business, and a
nation into a higher place. |