Why the study?
Do patient and spouse personality traits affect cardiac patients' subjective health?
Do patient and spouse personality traits affect cardiac patients' subjective health?
Patient personality affects subjective health through illness representations and interacts with spouse personality traits, highlighting the importance of interpersonal factors in cardiac patient well-being.
May highlight spouse traits in cardiac patients' subjective health; hypothesis-generating for dyadic personality interventions.
BACKGROUND: Little is known about the ways that personality is related to patient health, although there is some evidence that illness self-regulation as well as partner personality play a significant role. PURPOSE: The aim of the two present studies was to examine the intra-personal (i.e., through illness representations) and the inter-personal (i.e., partner) effects of personality on cardiac patients' subjective health. METHODS: One hundred fifteen patients participated in study 1; 75 patients and their spouses participated in study 2. RESULTS: The representations of illness consequences, personal control, and the attribution of illness to emotional causes mediated the relation of personality to health (first study). The relations of patients' extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness to their health were statistically significant at the higher levels (+1 SD) of spouse corresponding traits (second study). CONCLUSION: Personality affects patients' health through illness representations (intrapersonal level), as well as by interacting with partner personality (interpersonal level).
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Karademas et al. (2013) studied this question.
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