The science article is written by John Tierney: "What Is Nostalgia Good For? Quite a Bit, Research Shows". The article is really about the need for self-reflection. Yes, it is good thing generally when we remember episodes of the past.
A quick way to induce nostalgia is through music, which has become a favorite tool of researchers. In an experiment in the Netherlands, Ad J. J. M. Vingerhoets of Tilburg University and colleagues found that listening to songs made people feel not only nostalgic but also warmer physically.
That warm glow was investigated in southern China by Xinyue Zhou of Sun Yat-Sen University. By tracking students over the course of a month, she and colleagues found that feelings of nostalgia were more common on cold days. The researchers also found that people in a cool room (68 degrees Fahrenheit) were more likely to nostalgize than people in warmer rooms.
[P]eople tend to have a healthier sense of self-continuity if they nostalgize more frequently, as measured on the scale developed at Southampton. To understand why these memories seem reassuring, Clay Routledge of North Dakota State University and other psychologists conducted a series of experiments with English, Dutch and American adults.
First, the experimenters induced nostalgia by playing hit songs from the past for some people and letting them read lyrics to their favorite songs. Afterward, these people were more likely than a control group to say that they felt “loved” and that “life is worth living.”
Then the researchers tested the effect in the other direction by trying to induce existential angst. They subjected some people to an essay by a supposed Oxford philosopher who wrote that life is meaningless because any single person’s contribution to the world is “paltry, pathetic and pointless.” Readers of the essay became more likely to nostalgize, presumably to ward off Sartrean despair.
Moreover, when some people were induced to nostalgia before reading the bleak essay, they were less likely to be convinced by it. The brief stroll down memory lane apparently made life seem worthwhile, at least to the English students in that experiment. (Whether it would work with gloomy French intellectuals remains to be determined.)
“Nostalgia serves a crucial existential function,” Dr. Routledge says. “It brings to mind cherished experiences that assure us we are valued people who have meaningful lives. ..."
The usefulness of nostalgia seems to vary with age, according to Erica Hepper, a psychologist at the University of Surrey in England. She and her colleagues have found that nostalgia levels tend to be high among young adults, then dip in middle age and rise again during old age.
“Nostalgia helps us deal with transitions,” Dr. Hepper says. “The young adults are just moving away from home and or starting their first jobs, so they fall back on memories of family Christmases, pets and friends in school.”
“Many other people,” [Dr. Sedikides] explains, “have defined nostalgia as comparing the past with the present and saying, implicitly, that the past was better — ‘Those were the days.’ But that may not be the best way for most people to nostalgize. The comparison will not benefit, say, the elderly in a nursing home who don’t see their future as bright. But if they focus on the past in an existential way — ‘What has my life meant?’ — then they can potentially benefit.”
This comparison-free nostalgizing is being taught to first-year college students as part of a study testing its value for people in difficult situations. Other experiments are using the same technique in people in nursing homes, women recovering from cancer surgery, and prison inmates.
One does not know oneself unless one self-reflects. Bring on the nostalgia!
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