Young adults who are able to stay calm under stress may be less likely to develop high blood pressure as they age. In general, those who had larger blood-pressure responses to stressful situations like playing a video game or having their hand submerged in ice water had a greater risk for developing high blood pressure, and the greater their response, the sooner they developed high blood pressure. High blood pressure eventually affects up to 90 percent of Americans as they become elderly and is a leading cause of heart attack, stroke and heart failure. Emotional factors like stress are one of the major causes of high blood pressure, so learning how to reduce stress would be extremely helpful. The other major cause is a high-grain and high-sugar diet with not enough exercise. Following a healthy nutrition plan, along with exercising and emotional rebalancing, will normalize blood pressure in most people.
Yahoo! News June 21, 2004