Anger damages your heart? Here's truth

Try to calm yourself the next time a cold caller or car owner makes you angry during traffic. Take a deep breath, as anger truly is lethal, US scientists cautioned.

Researchers discovered that short bursts of rage can affect blood vessel function, thereby increasing the risk of a heart attack or stroke for as long as forty minutes, according to Daily Mail.

Dr Daichi Shimbo, study author and a professor of medicine at Columbia University, said: "We saw that evoking an angered state led to blood vessel dysfunction. Though we don't yet understand what may cause these changes."

Researchers described this effect as an "impairment in blood vessel dilation".

Theoretically, a blood supply disruption could result in a heart attack or stroke. The average age of the 280 volunteers whose data was examined was 26.

Everyone in the group was given a 30-minute relaxation period during which they were not permitted to talk, use their phones, read, or go to sleep. 

Before each person was allocated at random to one of four eight-minute tasks, their blood pressure was measured.

One was asked about a past incident that had upset them personally. Others had volunteers recollect an anxious situation or read a string of gloomy lines meant to make them feel down.

In the emotionally neutral fourth task, individuals had to count backward from 100 several times.