Housework: Clean Your Way to a Happy Heart

If you’re like me, the only thing more depressing than a cluttered mess at home is the thought of cleaning up the cluttered mess.

Apparently in Scotland, however, housecleaning and any other kind of physical activity actually prevents depression. Maybe it’s the lousy weather—anything is better than staring into the North Atlantic gray. In any case, a survey of nearly 20,000 Scots suggests that people who participate in just 20 minutes of any type of physical activity each week—even things as simple as walking, housework, or gardening—have a 13% to 20% lower risk of mental health problems than people who, I guess, are functionally inert.

More exercise brings more mental benefits: Sporty types are 33% better off than the couch haggises, according to the study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

However, these types of studies are tricky. For one thing, the bar is set pretty low—who doesn’t do at least 20 minutes of walking per week? Really, really depressed people, that’s who. It’s the old problem of cause and effect: If the really depressed person rises from bed to tackle the clutter, will that make her or him feel better?

We have to keep these sorts of studies in perspective, in other words, but in any case there is a wealth of evidence that exercise does indeed improve mental health.

“Laboratory studies show that mood can be elevated following short, 20-minute bouts of exercise,” says study author Mark Hamer, PhD, a senior research fellow at University College London.

Exercise’s benefits “may be derived from hormones that act on the central nervous system, by improving other risk factors, such as blood pressure and diabetes, and also through psychological processes, such as distraction from negative thoughts and improved mastery of coping," he says.

However, if you want to catch the mood elevator you’ll have to do something a bit more vigorous than dragging the Swiffer behind you on the way to the fridge.

“I should make it clear that we assessed vigorous forms of house chores, such as cleaning floors, gardening, house improvement work, etc.,”  says Dr. Hamer.

My conclusion: I will not change my view about housecleaning. But I will slam the door on the clutter on my way out to the gym.