The relationship between stress and health care use: An investigation of the buffering roles of personality, social support and exercise

The main and interactive effects of social support, physical exercise, and personal hardiness on objective measures of health were investigated using a longitudinal research design. Data were collected from 192 working adults . Results showed main effects for hardiness and exercise on the dependent v ariables of health care costs and the number of health insurance claims fil ed. Hardiness appeared to be associated with fewer health problems. Contrar y to prediction, those who exercised more appeared to have greater health c are use. Three-way interactions suggested that health care use was lowest f or those high in all three resistance resources: exercise; hardiness; and s ocial support. But, the converse of this reasoning, that absence of these r esources is associated with higher levels of illness, was not entirely supp orted. The interactions suggested that hardiness in the absence of exercise and social support was associated with the highest health care costs. The highest number of claims was apparent for those exhibiting hardiness and ex ercise. Thus, the presence of exercise, hardiness, and social support seeme d to decrease health care use, but the factors contributing to greater heal th costs and claims were more complicated to interpret. (C) 1999 Elsevier S cience Inc.