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This study highlights the importance of psychological symptoms in predicting tobacco cessation and relapse among individuals with cancer. Our findings suggest that breast cancer patients are more inclined to stop smoking than patients with other cancers, but future studies should attempt to delineate the effect on smoking cessation of gender and other demographics that characterize this subgroup. This study also suggests that a particular attention should be paid to the early management of depressive symptoms in order to prevent smoking relapse.

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Background Breast cancer patients tend to experience numerous concurrent psychological symptoms that form clusters. It has been proposed that a common psychological mechanism may underlie the membership of symptoms in a given cluster, but this hypothesis has never been investigated. Maladaptive emotion regulation (ER) is one possible common mechanism. Objective This study examined cross-sectional and prospective relationships between subjective (experiential avoidance, expressive suppression, and cognitive reappraisal) and objective (high-frequency heart rate variability) measures of ER and clusters of psychological symptoms among women receiving radiation therapy for breast cancer. Method A total of 81 women completed a battery of self-report scales before (T1) and after (T2) radiotherapy, including measures of anxiety, depression, fear of cancer recurrence, insomnia, fatigue, pain, and cognitive impairments. Resting high-frequency heart rate variability was measured at T1. Results Latent profile analyses identified between 2 and 3 clusters of patients with similar levels of symptoms at T1 and T2 and with a similar profile of symptom changes between T1 and T2. Discriminant analyses showed that higher levels of avoidance and suppression predicted membership in symptom clusters that included more severe symptoms cross-sectionally at T1 and at T2 (both P values < .0001). However, ER at T1 did not significantly predict membership in clusters of symptom changes between T1 and T2 (P = .15). Conclusion Maladaptive ER strategies, more particularly suppression and avoidance, are a possible psychological mechanism underlying clusters of cancer-related psychological symptoms. Implications for Practice Psychological interventions targeting maladaptive ER strategies have the potential to treat several psychological symptoms simultaneously.

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Background Accumulating evidence suggests that positive and negative emotions, as well as emotion regulation, play key roles in human health and disease. Recent work has shown the gut microbiome is important in modulating mental and physical health through the gut–brain axis. Yet, its association with emotions and emotion regulation are understudied. Here we examined whether positive and negative emotions, as well as two emotion regulation strategies (i.e. cognitive reappraisal and suppression), were associated with the gut microbiome composition and functional pathways in healthy women. Methods Participants were from the Mind-Body Study (N = 206, mean age = 61), a sub-study of the Nurses' Health Study II cohort. In 2013, participants completed measures of emotion-related factors. Two pairs of stool samples were collected, 6 months apart, 3 months after emotion-related factors measures were completed. Analyses examined associations of emotion-related factors with gut microbial diversity, overall microbiome structure, and specific species/pathways and adjusted for relevant covariates. Results Alpha diversity was negatively associated with suppression. In multivariate analysis, positive emotions were inversely associated with the relative abundance of Firmicutes bacterium CAG 94 and Ruminococcaceae bacterium D16, while negative emotions were directly correlated with the relative abundance of these same species. At the metabolic pathway level, negative emotions were inversely related to the biosynthesis of pantothenate, coenzyme A, and adenosine. Conclusions These findings offer human evidence supporting linkages of emotions and related regulatory processes with the gut microbiome and highlight the importance of incorporating the gut microbiome in our understanding of emotion-related factors and their associations with physical health.

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Background and Objectives Identifying potential intervention strategies to reduce cognitive decline, particularly among older African Americans at high risk for Alzheimer's dementia, is critical. This study aimed to investigate whether depressive symptoms, purpose in life, and their inter-relations are associated with cognitive decline in older African Americans. Research Design and Methods We included older African Americans from the Minority Aging Research Study (n=748) and Rush Memory and Aging Project (n=109), without dementia at baseline. We assessed associations of depressive symptoms, purpose in life, and their inter-relations, with baseline levels and change in global cognition using linear mixed-effects models. Results At baseline, each unit increment in depressive symptoms was related to worse initial global cognition (mean difference=-0.03 standard unit; P=.003), while higher purpose in life was related to better cognition (mean difference=0.12; P=.002). Further, participants with ≥1 depressive symptom who had a purpose in life score above the median appeared to have better global cognition (mean difference=0.10; P=.01), compared to those with depressive symptoms but lower levels of purpose in life. However, we did not find relations of depressive symptoms or purpose in life with rates of cognitive decline over time, likely due to the modest follow-up. Discussion and Implications In older African Americans, we found that lower depressive symptoms and greater purpose in life were independently related to higher initial levels of global cognition, but not cognitive decline. Preliminary findings of higher global cognition in individuals with depressive symptoms but greater purpose in life merit further investigation if purpose may eventually be considered as an intervention.