PERSONALITY-FACTORS RELATED TO THE PREVALENCE OF SOMATIC SYMPTOMS ANDMEDICAL COMPLAINTS IN A HEALTHY STUDENT POPULATION

Previous research in somatization has identified strong positive relat ionships between this variable, and both neuroticism, and depression. Many studies, however, are limited by a cross-sectional approach, corr elational analyses, and/or the restriction to clinical (psychiatric or medical) populations. The present investigation prospectively compare d the relationships between neuroticism, depression, and somatic sympt oms in a healthy student sample. As predicted, neuroticism and depress ion were significantly and positively related to symptom reporting. Th e results of a multiple regression analysis indicated that depression contributed significantly to the variance in symptom-reporting even af ter controlling for the effects of neuroticism. This finding suggests the importance of mood state in the experience of somatic symptoms. Ho wever, this influence is not independent of the trait neuroticism The results of this study also indicated that females reported significant ly more symptoms than males, and gender-specific relationships are dis cussed.