It’s amazing. Year after year, study after study, researchers determine that certain behaviors result in a longer, healthier life. Yet do people listen? Well, generally, no. There’s so much noise in health and medical research, very few news organizations or their reporters spend an extra few hours of research to put the results into context. News is only “news” if it comes out at the same time everyone else publishes it.

So chalk another study up to the noise — that men can live a longer, healthier life if they become aware of certain risk factors and seek to reduce them:

High grip strength and avoidance of overweight, hyperglycemia, hypertension, smoking, and excessive alcohol consumption were associated with both overall and exceptional survival. In addition, high education and avoidance of hypertriglyceridemia were associated with exceptional survival…

That translates, roughly, into “exercising regularly, eating right, avoiding smoking and excessive alcohol consumption,” which is exactly what you already knew. Higher education also tends to be positively associated with a longer life. Hypertriglyceridemia is caused by obesity, diabetes, or excessive alcohol consumption, generally.

But this should wake you up a little:

[...] and lack of a marital partner was associated with mortality before age 85 years.

Ouch.

It pays to get married then, if you like a long life. (Although, frankly, 85 seems like a pretty grand old age as well.)

Read the full abstract at JAMA.

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    Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 14 Nov 2006