EFFECTS OF EMOTIONS ON HEALTH

 EFFECTS OF EMOTIONS ON HEALTH

                emotional expression especially of negative feelings can have an adverse effect on the progres­sion of certain types of illness, such as cancer. People who tend to experience negative emotions and who also inhibit self-expression in their social interactions are exhibiting a pattern of behavior recently termed the Type D—for distressed personality type.Individuals who cope with stress by keeping their negative emotions to themselves are likely to experience suppressed immune systems, greater recurrence of cancer, and higher mor­tality rates. In contrast, patients who demonstrate positive affect, especially joy, well-being, and happiness—increase the likelihood of recovery.An intriguing finding is the relation between expression of distress and treatment outcome. Open expression of negative affect and a willingness to fight illness are sometimes associated with greater immune function, decreased recurrence rates, and increased survival time, even among patients at advanced stages of cancer. For example, combative individuals, those who express anger about getting cancer and hostility towards their doctors and family members—often live longer than patients who passively accept their fate and quietly undergo treatment.Emotion can also play a role in the progression of hypertension, or high blood pressure, a condition in which the pressure within the blood vessels is abnormally high. Prolonged hypertension, when untreated, can result in extensive damage to the entire circulatory system. Indeed, about 30 percent of cardiovascular disease deaths each year are attributable to hypertension. Some evidence suggests that emotional stressors can affect the regulation of blood pressure through neuro-hormonal mechanisms.For example, anxiety and hostility can increase general arousal and facili­tate the release of catecholamine a class of neurotransmitters that play an important role in the sympathetic nervous system. The release of the catecholamine epinephrine has the effect of boosting a person’s overall readi­ness to act; a rise in blood pressure is part of this overall readiness.

                                                                         Although the effects of emotional stressors are usually brief, extreme reactivity to anxiety, hostility, and anger may indicate a predisposition to develop hyper­tension. Not surprisingly, the strongest relations between emotions and blood pressure have been found for unexpressed anger and hostility. Fortunately, research has shown that people can learn to reduce such tendencies.In one study, Gidron and Davidson (1996) identified a group of participants who scored high on measures of cynical hostility, the harmful component of the Type A behavior pattern. Half of these persons were assigned to an eight-week inter­vention specifically designed to modify cynical hostility; the other half (the control group) received information about the link between hostility and heart disease and about ways to reduce hostility.Participants assigned to the intervention condition attended weekly meetings, monitored their hostility daily, and received instruction in the use of specific coping skills; for example, they learned to use relaxation exercises and practiced ways to vent their angry feelings. The participants in the intervention group showed significant improvement on measures of cynical hostility, whereas participants assigned to the control group did not.