The Best Way To Reduce Anger Isn't Venting Or Running

Common sense suggests that venting anger will help reduce it. There are many classic adages to suggest so: "Get it off your chest," "Blow off some steam," and "Just let it out, already!" Such advice leads many people to believe that if they  simply vent their angry feelings out loud, they'll find some relief. This often manifests as shouting, reckless accusations, and even purchasing tickets for "rage rooms," where enraged individuals can smash things in their rampage. However, scientific studies posit that not only does venting fail to reduce feelings of anger, but it can actually make such feelings worse.

Indeed, according to a 2024 meta-analysis by researchers from The Ohio State University, the data from 154 separate studies on anger management largely destroy the myth that "getting it off your chest" is helpful. In fact, venting can actually increase something called "physiological arousal," which often enhances pre-existing feelings of anger. So, instead of venting, you may try to go for a run to burn off the anger. Unfortunately, this too can increase physiological arousal and make the situation worse. According to the research, it seems that getting worked up when you're already worked up isn't helpful for calming down.

Thus, managing anger is all about reducing this physiological arousal, which is anything that stimulates the autonomic nervous system. This includes activities that raise the heart rate, blood pressure, breathing, and hormonal responses. As many readers already guessed, the best activities for reducing physiological arousal include mindfulness, yoga, progressive muscle relaxation, focused diaphragmatic breathing, and any other activity that helps slow respiration. In other words, managing anger is all about deep breathing, not heavy cardio.

It seems that managing anger is harder than most people might think. The OSU researchers state that anger is the emotion that "people have the most difficulty regulating." The reason for such difficulty lies in anger's exceptional triggering of physiological arousal, which activates the body's fight-or-flight response. Our fight-or-flight response was once an important feature for our hunter-gatherer ancestors, causing time to seem to slow down, but it can create significant challenges in the modern world. Reducing the fight-or-flight response is critical to reducing feelings of anger. 

According to the study, many of the activities associated with managing anger are good for cardiovascular health yet unhelpful for reducing physiological arousal. Jogging, especially, was found to be a healthy cardiovascular activity that can make a sour mood worse. Instead, simple breathing exercises have been shown to decrease feelings of anger and anxiety. Really, any breath-focused practice will do the trick: yoga, meditation, mindfulness, and biofeedback exercises have been shown to reduce the physiological arousal that exacerbates anger.

Thus, reducing feelings of anger isn't about venting, but rather focusing on the breath. The study's lead author Sophie Kjærvik was quoted in a Science Alert interview saying, "Reducing arousal, and actually the physiological aspect of it, is really important." As the meta-analysis shows, ethnicity, culture, race, or age have a negligible effect on anger-reducing practices. Ultimately, it seems that breath-focused practices are the best way to reduce anger, so maybe rage rooms are actually the opposite of helpful. If you want to reduce feelings of anger, focusing on the breath is the best approach.