PREDICTORS OF HEALTH SELF-APPRAISAL - WHATS INVOLVED IN FEELING HEALTHY

Increased interest in the prevention of illness underscores the import ance of understanding how people evaluate their health. This study inv estigated self-report measures of health status, medical complaints, a nd psychosocial factors in 455 undergraduates. After controlling for n euroticism, regression analyses indicated that positive mood, negative mood, perceived vulnerability to illness, and vitality were significa nt contributors to self-assessed health independent of physical sympto ms and diseases. Together, psychosocial factors accounted for more var iance in health assessments (R2 = .44) than did disease and symptom re ports alone (R2 = .25; p < .01 for all betas). These results demonstra te the strong association of psychosocial states with evaluations of h ealth and suggest that physical discomfort may play a relatively minor role in how ''healthy'' we feel.