Want a long and healthy life? Write: ``I, my, it, you, me, she, he, her, we, they, your, him, his, them, our, myself, their, us and its.''

Repeat every day.

Using a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health, psychologists have found that the frequent use of different pronouns is a powerful predictor of better health.

''It does sound weird,'' said James Pennebaker, a psychologist at the University of Texas at Austin, whose report is in the January issue of Psychological Science. ``As it turns out, pronouns are really important -- they are reflecting people's identity and relationships with others.''

Pennebaker analyzed writing samples from 183 students and maximum-security prisoners. Earlier research had found that when the volunteers wrote about emotional and nonemotional topics for 15 to 20 minutes every day, those who drew on their deepest feelings and wrote about their most traumatic experiences eventually had fewer doctors' visits, better immune system functioning, lower stress and various social and cognitive benefits.

Later, Pennebaker and graduate student Sherlock Campbell analyzed the writing again, and tied the better health status specifically to using 19 different pronouns.

Pennebaker said those who changed pronouns frequently in their writing -- going from ''I did this, I did that'' on one day to ''he did this, he did that'' on the next -- were seeing the world from a variety of perspectives, which apparently has health benefits.

Adeptly changing pronouns themselves throughout their scientific paper, the psychologists wrote: ``Our conclusion that changes in pronoun use predict health is a rather bold and, at the same time, enigmatic statement.''