Psychologist David McClelland of Harvard has found that when students are shown a film designed to inspire feelings of love and caring, an antibody—salivary IgA—increases, providing major protection against colds and upper respiratory infection. The film they saw was on Mother Teresa, the nun who won a Nobel peace prize for her work in caring for the poor on the streets of Calcutta.
Even those who professed intense dislike for Mother Teresa—some said she was a fake and that her work did no good—showed immune function improvement. Such a finding is consistent with McClelland’s theory that deeper, unconscious beliefs and motives determine people’s bodily reactions and their behavior more than do conscious cognitions . . . .
When the students were shown a film on Attila the Hun, their antibody levels dropped.
