Cracking a smile regularly may be good not just for your mood but for your health

Reminding yourself to smile often can not only make more friendships but it can also make you feel better.And rather than wait for a reason to smile, just making the physical change of literally turning that frown upside down could impact emotions, according to experts.Research backs up the fact that smiling goes a long way.Some older research has focused on this “facial feedback hypothesis,” according to Jeanne Tsai, a longtime psychology professor at Stanford University who runs the Culture and Emotion Lab. In one often replicated experiment, researchers would have subjects put a pencil between their lips and adopt a smile or a frown while viewing a positive movie clip like a cartoon. Some subjects who smiled would feel the sensation of the smile more and be more amused.“When we’ve done that demonstration in classes, it works,” Tsai said. “When you’re doing it in a room by yourself, you’re not doing it in a social interaction, maybe it’s making you remember, or it’s an effect of reme