The relation of smoking to psychological and physiological risk factors for coronary heart disease

Abstract

Smoking has been held to be responsible for a great number of diseases. Yet criticism has been raised about the role of smoking as the cause or independent cause of the diseases. This study was motivated by Eysenck's thesis that smoking and personality affect disease synergistically. The purpose was to examine the relation of smoking to psychological and physiological risk factors for coronary heart disease (CHD). The former were the Type A Behavior Pattern and its constitutents assessed by the Jenkins Activity Survey (JAS), the latter were systolic and diastolic blood pressure, cholesterol, HDL, triglycerides and the Quetelet body mass index. There were 520 randomly selected subjects (302 men, 218 women), 46–65 yr old. The results showed that smoking was related to higher scores on the JAS scales of Type A, Hard Driving, and Speed and Impatience, and lower scores on Job Involvement. Further, smokers had lower HDL, higher body mass index and lower systolic blood pressure. The results indicate that smoking is not an independent risk factor for CHD, and if it affects the risk for CHD then it is only in conjunction with the other psychological and physiological risk factors. Further, in view of deviant findings in different subsamples it is important to study large samples and check results in subsamples of age, gender and education.