Holidays: How do they Affect Your Health?

There are an abundance of health benefits that arise from kicking off your shoes, breaking your routine and escaping to a sunny getaway location. Often when people return from holiday they are greeted with an immeasurable number of complements about how they seem revitalized…new research highlights that this may not be that far from the truth. Holidays by the sea have particularly been seen to aid in the area of psychological benefits and rejuvenation.

The European Centre for Environment and Human Health reports that outdoor locations, primarily coastal landscapes, have positive associations of calmness, enjoyment and refreshment.

According to Nuffieldhealth.com the core advantages to holiday-making can be condensed to these 3 categories: resilience to stress, sleep quality and blood pressure. These should be significant results for those that already lead a hectic lifestyle. These results were produced by taking 12 people and giving them heart monitors and psychological tests over a two week period of time. Stress resilience was seen to increase by 29%; the average blood pressure was reduced by 6% and the subjects’ ability to sleep was increased dramatically.

This is not the only study to sing the praises of short breaks, it has also been suggested that the secret to becoming an effective worker lays in…well, not working. Many are under the false impression that this is counter-intuitive, but downtime and breaks are vitally important. A study by Adecco showed that 1 in 3 of us would fail to take our free holiday allocation this year, but this is a sure-fire way to become burnt out. One of the most famous studies in this regard took place in the 1920s, when Henry Ford discovered that his work force got just as much work done in 5 days as they did in 6 – it seems that this insight is still as true today as it ever was. More working hours does not equal more productivity.

If you’re thinking about taking your well-deserved and entirely justified holiday, consider looking at our Holiday Cottages in Cornwall and Cornwall Self Catering pages…