Hostility May Contribute to Heart Disease

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Hostility May Contribute to Heart Disease

A personality and character trait, hostility involves cynicism, mistrust of others, anger, and overt and repressed aggression. Several mechanisms have been proposed to explain why hostility may the risk for coronary artery disease, including the adoption of other unhealthy lifestyle behaviors.

Previous studies investigating the potential association of high hostility level with coronary pathology (coronary atherosclerosis, hypertension and coronary artery disease) have yielded conflicting results.

This study involving 374 men and women (18-30 years of age at baseline) investigated whether hostility is associated with coronary calcification, an indicator of subclinical atherosclerosis. Data on hostility were collected by way of the Cook-Medley hostility questionnaire from 1985-1986 and at year five examinations from 1990-1992. After the 10-year examinations (1995-1996), electron-beam CT scans were taken to assess the presence of detectable coronary artery calcification.

Results: A positive association was noted between hostility scores at baseline and coronary artery calcification at 10-year followup. Subjects with higher-than-average hostility scores had more than two times the risk of measurable coronary calcification compared to subjects with below-average hostility. The five-year change in hostility was also positively associated with coronary artery calcification. These associations were maintained after adjusting for demographic, lifestyle and physiological variables. As the authors conclude: "... a high hostility level may predispose young adults to coronary artery calcification."

Iribarren C, Sidney S, Bild DE, et al. Association of hostility with coronary artery calcification in young adults. Journal of the American Medical Association, May 17, 2000:283(19), pp2546-51.