An exploration of the relationship between hostility and disease

Hostility has been studied mainly in relation to coronary heart disease (CHD). However, givern the pathways linking hostility to CHD,it might be expected that hostility also relates to non-CHD. Therefore, the relation between the expression and the experience of hostility and various health outcomes was examined in a cross- sectional design. The data were collected among male patients with a myocardial infarction in the age range of 30-70 years (N=279) and a population sample of men in the same age group (N=2663). Based on a checklist of the most frequent disorders, the subjects from the latter group were divided into subsamples according to their disease status. Three components of hostility, i.e., resentment, suspicion, and aggression, were measured by the Buss Durkee Hostility Inventory (Buss & Durkee, 1957). The overall findong was that all components of hostility were related to non-CHD disease but not to CHD