Want to Live Longer? Visit an Art Gallery, Frequent a Museum, Go to the Theater and Attend a Concert

“Engaging with art, music and theater broadens our perspectives on both history and contemporary culture,” said Anne Butler Rice, Georgette Auerbach Koopman Director of Education at the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford. 

Apparently, the impact may even be greater.  Rice’s comments come in the wake of new research which suggests that being exposed to the arts may help people live longer.

Researchers in London who followed thousands of people 50 and older over a 14-year period discovered that those who went to a museum or attended a concert just once or twice a year were 14 percent less likely to die during that period than those who didn’t, according to a report in The New York Times.

The chances of living longer only went up the more frequently people engaged with the arts, according to the study, which was published recently in The BMJ, formerly The British Medical Journal.

“When we participate in these activities, our experiences are often social and emotional, reminding us that we are all connected by human creativity,” Rice explained.  “It seems that’s truly uplifting for our imaginations, hearts and souls.”

The London study is believed to be the first comprehensive examination of the effects of art on mortality, Professor Andrew Steptoe, a co-author of the study and the head of University College London’s research department of behavioral science and health, told The Times.

The study concludes that the association between the arts and longevity “might be partly explained by differences in cognition, mental health, and physical activity among those who do and do not engage in the arts, but remains even when … adjusted for these factors.”

David Green, Executive Director of the Cultural Alliance of Fairfield County, points out that “While art therapy programs such as New Canaan’s ‘Art for Healing,’ or Mental Health Connecticut’s ‘Mending Art,’ provide effective healing tools in extreme cases of illness or trauma, it’s good to read more evidence of what we know intuitively - that time spent making art or actively engaging with and appreciating the arts - music, painting, dance, literature - centers us, makes us more whole, more resilient, and now, it seems, can make us live longer."

Barbara Bagan, PhD, ATR-BC, a professor of expressive arts therapy at Ottawa University in Phoenix, AZ, has said that “viewing art causes the brain to continue to reshape, adapt, and restructure, thus expanding the potential to increase brain reserve capacity.

From 2004 to 2005, researchers collected data from 6,710 people who responded to questionnaires about how often they went to concerts, museums, galleries, the theater or the opera. In addition to providing personal information such as age, gender, ethnicity, marital status, educational background, profession and income, participants also answered questions about their physical and mental health, how often they smoked or drank, and how much exercise they got, The Times reported.

Over the next 14 years, about 2,000 participants died — a vast majority of them from illnesses related to cancer, cardiovascular disease, respiratory problems and other natural causes, according to the study, published in December 2019.

“The researchers combed through the data they had collected to search for patterns. They said their findings suggested, but did not prove, that participating in the arts could lead to a longer life span,” The Times reported.  No differences were found in the impact of the arts on the longevity of men and women.