kissing and making up with your partner before going to bed really does improve your mood the next day

Kissing and making up with your partner before sleeping really does improve your mood the next day, a new study has suggested.

After fighting, couples with high activity in a certain outer brain region are less likely to be upset the next day, while those with low activity are more likely to be in a bad mood, continue to mull over the argument in their heads, and turn to alcohol or drugs, the study found.

The lateral prefrontal cortex is thought to be involved in the way people control their emotions, with more activity linked to more emotional resilience, reports The Daily Express .

The study was conducted by Harvard and California University psychologists and is published in the Biological Psychiatry journal. Lead author Professor Christine Hooker said: "What we found, as you might expect, was that everybody felt badly on the day of the conflict with their partners. But the day after, people who had high lateral prefrontal cortex activity felt better and the people who had low lateral prefrontal cortex activity continued to feel bad."