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Experiencing intense emotions with others makes people feel more connected, study finds

Participants bonded more after watching films that sparked intense emotions

These videos were either positive (a comedy), negative (a film showing the suffering of captive animals) or neutral (footage of a university library). For each participant the team also recorded an electrocardiogram as well as respiratory activity and skin conductance, to track physical metrics that indicated how the strength of their emotions changed. “We found that silently watching emotional films together with another individual is associated with social bonding, even when this person is a stranger and without any verbal communication,” said Chung.

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