Financial Worries Cause Physical Pain, Says New Study

Image: Worried by Alon (CC BY 2.0)

It's normal to feel worried, anxious or down when times are hard. Around 72% of us feel stressed about money at some point in our lives. Most people who experience worries will recover in few days or weeks, but for a small number of people, anxiety and low mood do not go away, and these feelings interfere with their daily lives.

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Now, a new study conducted by University of Virginia at Charlottesville in the US suggests financial problems can cause physical pain. Lead author Eileen Chou and colleagues found that people who feel financially unstable experiencemore physical pain than those who feel financially secure.

The researchers said the stimulus behind their study is their observation that complaints of physical pain and economic security have both increased over the past decade. They aimed to ascertain if the two were linked.

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Chow and colleagues conducted 6 studies in which they evaluated the link between economic security and physical pain.

In one study, the researchers picked a geographically diverse consumer panel of 33,720 people across the US. They analyzed the employment status of each individual and examined how this related to their purchase of over-the-counter (OTC) painkillers.

The team discovered that households in which both adults were unemployed spent around 20% more on OTC painkillers compared with households in which at least one adult was employed in 2008.


Another study carried out online involved 187 participants. The researchers discovered that participants who were unemployed and deemed financially insecure at state level were more likely to report experiencing physical pain on a four-item pain scale, compared with employed, financially stable participants.

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Further online study showed that participants who recalled an economically unstable period were at almost twice the amount of physical pain compared with those who recalled an economically stable period in their lives. Participants’ age, employment status and negative emotion were accounted for the study.

The connection between financial insecurity and pain tolerance was also assessed in the study. In a study conducted inside laboratory, the researchers asked students to imagine entering a stable or unstable job market while placing one hand in a bucket full of ice water. Tolerance of pain was measured by how long participants could keep their hand in the ice water.

The result showed that students who thought about entering an unstable job market were unable to keep their hand in the ice water for long, indicating they had reduced pain tolerance compared with students who thought about entering a stable job market.


In another study, researchers used both “experimental-causal-chain and measurement-of-mediation approaches.” They found that feelings of economic security among participants were driven by the feeling that they had a lack of control over their lives.

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Chou commented on the study saying:

"Overall, our findings reveal that it physically hurts to be economically insecure. Results from six studies establish that economic insecurity produces physical pain, reduces pain tolerance, and predicts over-the-counter painkiller consumption."

The researchers believe their findings may have important implications for the general public, researchers and policy makers. They concluded by saying:

"By showing that physical pain has roots in economic insecurity and feelings of lack of control, the current findings offer hope for short-circuiting the downward spiral initiated by economic insecurity and producing a new, positive cycle of well-being and pain-free experience.

The study was published in Psychological Science - a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.