HOSTILITY, CIGARETTE-SMOKING AND ALCOHOL-CONSUMPTION IN THE GENERAL-POPULATION

Hostility has been associated with coronary heart disease, and hostili ty may affect coronary risk through its influence on risk factors such as cigarette smoking and alcohol consumption. The objective of this s tudy was to determine relationships between hostile personality, cigar ette smoking and alcohol consumption in the general population. The Ed inburgh Artery Study comprises a cross-sectional survey of 1592 men an d women aged 55-74 years sampled from age-sex registers of 10 general practices throughout the city. The Bedford-Foulds Personality Deviance Questionnaire was used to elicit extrapunitiveness (including hostile thoughts), dominance (including hostile acts) and intropunitiveness. Social class, age and deprivation score were controlled far in multiva riate analyses. The hostile thoughts scale emerged as a significant in dependent predictor of alcohol consumption in men and women (P less th an or equal to 0.01), and the models accounted for 4-9% of the varianc e in alcohol consumption. Hostile acts were independently predictive o f smoking in men (P less than or equal to 0.001), with the model accou nting for 5% of the variance in smoking. Hostile thoughts were indepen dently predictive of smoking in women (P less than or equal to 0.001), and the model accounted for 4% of the variance in their smoking. We c onclude that hostility may affect coronary risk through its influence on lifestyle-related coronary risk factors, although in future further elucidation of hostility type and standard measurement of hostility a re necessary. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.