ENDOCRINE CORRELATES OF PERSONALITY-TRAITS - A COMPARISON BETWEEN EMOTIONALLY STABLE AND EMOTIONALLY LABILE HEALTHY-YOUNG MEN

An initial sample of 120-healthy young men was screened by a personali ty questionnaire and 15 subjects each with highest and lowest scores r espectively on emotionality (emotionally labile, EL subjects and emoti onally stable, ES subjects) were recruited for a study on the relation ship between the degree of emotionality and the basal secretion of str ess-sensitive hormones during nighttime. The nocturnal urinary excreti on of cortisol, testosterone, adrenaline, noradrenaline and melatonin was measured over a period of 5 consecutive nights. The average amount s of each hormone excreted per night were not different between the tw o extreme groups. The variability of the excretion during the 5 nights of cortisol and testosterone, but not of adrenaline, noradrenaline an d melatonin, was significantly higher in EL compared to ES subjects. T he larger fluctuations in the nocturnal secretion of these two (and no other) hormones in EL subjects indicate that emotional lability is as sociated with a more labile regulation of cortisol and testosterone se cretion. The observed intraindividual variability of basal stress horm one secretion may contribute to the vast interindividual variability n oticed in psychoneuroendocrine stress research, especially in emotiona lly labile subjects.