Cynical hostility at home and work: Psychosocial vulnerability across domains

Smith, Timothy W.; Pope, Mary Katherine; Sanders, Jill D.; Allred, Kenneth D.; O'Keeffe, Jennifer L.

doi:10.1016/0092-6566(88)90008-6

Cited by 185 publications

(150 citation statements)

References 55 publications

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“…In addition to greater psychophysiological response to stressors, hostility is also associated with lower levels of social support and greater exposure to stress at home and work (T. Q. Miller, Marksides, Chiriboga, & Ray, 1995;Newton & Kiecolt-Glaser, 1995;Smith, Pope, Sanders, Allred, & O'Keefe, 1988). This greater psychosocial vulnerability (Smith, 1994), in turn, may reflect a transactional process in which hostile persons undermine sources of support and foster conflicts through their mistrusting thoughts and antagonistic actions (Smith, 1995).…”

Section: Hostility As the Toxic Component Of The Type A Patternmentioning

confidence: 99%

Psychosocial influences on the development and course of coronary heart disease: Current status and implications for research and practice.

Smith¹,

Ruiz²

2002

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

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Psychosocial characteristics predict the development and course of coronary heart disease (CHD). In this review, the authors discussed human and animal research on psychophysiological mechanisms influencing coronary artery disease and its progression to CHD. They then reviewed literature on personality and characteristics of the social environment as risk factors for CHD. Hostility confers increased risk, and a group of risk factors involving depression and anxiety may be especially important following myocardial infarction. Social isolation, interpersonal conflict, and job stress confer increased risk. Psychosocial interventions may have beneficial effects on CHD morbidity and mortality, although inconsistent results and a variety of methodological limitations preclude firm conclusions. Finally, they discussed implications for clinical care and the agenda for future research.Coronary heart disease (CHD) is the leading cause of death in the United States; each year about 450,000 people die from CHD, and 1,000,000 experience an initial or recurrent coronary event (American Heart Association, 2001). Among healthy 40-year olds, between 40% and 50% of men and between 25% and 35% of women will later develop CHD (Lloyd-Jones, Larson, Beiser, & Levy, 1999). Over $100 billion is spent on CHD each year in the United States in direct medical costs, disability payments, and lost productivity (American Heart Association, 2001). This disease involves the three major topics composing behavioral medicine and health psychology, making it a central focus throughout their 30-year history. In the first (i.e., health behavior and prevention), modifiable behavioral risk factors (e.g., smoking, activity level, diet) are important risk factors for the development of CHD (Stamler et al., 1999;Wannamethee, Shaper, Walker, & Ebrahim, 1998), and behavior change is an essential component of prevention. In the second topic (i.e., stress and disease or psychosomatics), other psychological and social factors have more direct effects on the development and course of CHD through the intervening psychobiological effects of stress and negative emotions. In the third (i.e., psychosocial aspects of medical illness and care), established CHD has extensive emotional and social impacts on patients and their families, behavior is a key element of standard care (e.g., medication adherence, dietary change, exercise), and psychosocial interventions are useful additions to traditional medical and surgical treatment.Like the article on CHD in the previous special issue on behavioral medicine in this journal (Thoresen & Powell, 1992), we focused primarily on the second major topic-psychosocial influences on the development and course of CHD. We also reviewed one aspect of the third topic-interventions targeting psychosocial risk factors and their underlying psychophysiological mechanisms. Perhaps the most important implication of research on psychosocial risk factors for coronary disease is that interventions targeting these factors could reduce cardiac morb...

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Section: Hostility As the Toxic Component Of The Type A Patternmentioning

confidence: 99%

Psychosocial influences on the development and course of coronary heart disease: Current status and implications for research and practice.

Smith¹,

Ruiz²

2002

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

Self Cite

292

208

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…In several studies (e.g. Smith & Frohm, 1985 ;Smith et al 1988 ;Appelberg et al 1991 ;Houston & Vavak, 1991), links between hostility, lack of social support, interpersonal conflicts at work, and experience of stress have been reported.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Response of hostile individuals to stressful change in their working lives: test of a psychosocial vulnerability model

et al. 1998

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Background. According to the psychosocial vulnerability model, the health of hostile individuals is at greater risk than that of non-hostile individuals, due partly to lesser ability of the former to cope with psychosocial stress situations. We examined whether hostile individuals were more vulnerable than others to health problems when faced with stressful changes in their working lives. Methods. Hostility, sickness absence and psychosocial stressors in 866 local government employees over a 5-year period, which included severe economic decline, were investigated. Hostility was measured by a questionnaire. Data on medically certified sickness absence were obtained from the records of the local authority. Information about exposure to psychosocial stressors after assessment of hostility was also derived from these records, and from reports from the subjects. Results. Exposure to stressors during the period of economic decline was related to increased rates of sickness absence. In men, hostility increased risk of sickness absence after exposure to stressors only in cases of absence because of trauma. In women, hostility increased risk of absence through sickness overall and absence because of musculoskeletal disorders in individuals facing stressors such as severe organizational downsizing, high or increased levels of job demands or negative change in work. Findings were adjusted for sickness absence at the beginning of the decline, socioeconomic background and behavioural risk factors. Conclusions. The psychosocial vulnerability model was partly supported. However, heightened vulnerability through hostility may differ between the sexes, since it was more evident in the women studied than in the men.

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“…A case in point is the "stress engendering" personality attribute of hostility, reflecting a propensity toward cynicism, anger, and mistrust (Barefoot & Lipkus, 1994). Hostile individuals are exposed to more interpersonal conflict (Smith et al, 1988), and then respond to these social stressors with greater anger and physiological arousal than their nonhostile counterparts (Suls & Wan, 1998). Elevated physiological arousal to stress is a risk for the development of coronary heart disease (Krantz & Manuck, 1984).…”

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confidence: 99%

Daily interpersonal events in pain patients: Applying action theory to chronic illness

Davis

Affleck

Tennen³

2006

J Clin Psychol

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Action theory proposes that individuals actively shape and then respond to their environments, highlighting the role of stable person characteristics in the development and maintenance of life's interpersonal difficulties. In this study, we adopted the action perspective in our examination of the daily lives of chronic pain patients with rheumatoid arthritis. Our evaluation of patients' daily diary reports indicated that individuals played a more prominent role in shaping their positive versus their negative social worlds. The contribution of symptoms of ill health and demographic characteristics, as well as personality attributes were also examined as stable factors that predicted exposure to and appraisal of events. In addition to between-person measures, day to day variations in illness symptoms also played a key role in predicting their social experinces. Together, these findings suggest that stable person characteristics and within-person fluctuations in ill health are each tied to daily interpersonal experiences for those in chronic pain. More broadly, they point to the value of capturing the experiences of individuals intensively over time, an approach that can help to elaborate the contributions of both stable factors and circumstance in shaping our social contexts. Keywords action theory; rheumatoid arthritis; chronic pain; interpersonal events Action theory asserts that individuals play a substantial role in shaping their social contexts (Brandtstadter, 1998;Lerner, 1983). Through our own behavior, we each garner reactions from those around us, and these reactions in turn influence our functioning and quality of life. To some extent, then, action theory suggests that we are masters of our own universe, generating the conditions in which we live, albeit often unwittingly. This perspective is woven throughout the literature, largely focusing on how individuals create stressful interpersonal environments that precipitate and/or maintain their poor functioning (e.g., Bolger & Zuckerman, 1995;Suls & Martin, 2005). Within the realm of mental health, Joiner and colleagues (1995;1999), for example, have reported that individuals with a propensity to seek reassurance from others report more stressful interpersonal events, which in turn contribute prospectively to elevations in their levels of depressive symptoms. In a similar vein, Hammen (1991) has found evidence consistent with her "stress generation" model of depression. Compared to those who are not depressed, depressed individuals experience a higher rate of self-generated life events, promoting future depression (e.g., Hammen, 1991 (Nelson et al., 2001).In the domain of physical health, action theory has some currency as well. Health psychologists have long recognized the importance of social environment, including social isolation and conflict, as a key predictor of disease risk and adaptation (e.g., Taylor & Repetti, 1997), The recognition has fueled interest in understanding individual differences as determinants of health and illness through t...

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Cynical hostility at home and work: Psychosocial vulnerability across domains

Cited by 185 publications

References 55 publications

Psychosocial influences on the development and course of coronary heart disease: Current status and implications for research and practice.

Psychosocial influences on the development and course of coronary heart disease: Current status and implications for research and practice.

Response of hostile individuals to stressful change in their working lives: test of a psychosocial vulnerability model

Daily interpersonal events in pain patients: Applying action theory to chronic illness

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