Personality as a risk factor in large bowel cancer: data from the Melbourne Colorectal Cancer Study

Abstract

SYNOPSISIn a case control study which formed one arm of a large, population-based investigation of colorectal cancer incidence, aetiology and survival, ‘The Melbourne Colorectal Cancer Study’, among others, 22 psychosocially orientated questions were asked by personal interview of 637 histologically confirmed new cases of colorectal cancer and 714 age/sex frequency matched community controls, from Melbourne (population 2·81 million). Self-reported childhood or adult life ‘unhappiness’ was statistically significantly more common among the cancer cases, while ‘unhappiness with retirement’ was similarly distributed among cases and controls. Questions which were formulated to test a particular personality profile as a cancer risk, and which included the elements of denial and repression of anger and of other negative emotions, a commitment to prevailing social norms resulting in the external appearance of a ‘nice’ or ‘good’ person, a suppression of reactions which may offend others and the avoidance of conflict, showed a statistically significant discrimination between cases and controls. The risk of colorectal cancer with respect to this model was independent of the previously found risk factors of diet, beer intake, and family history of colorectal cancer, and was also independent of other potential confounding factors of socioeconomic level, marital status, religion and country of birth. Although the results must be interpreted with caution, the data are consistent with the hypothesis that this personality type may play a role in the clinical expression of colorectal cancer and was also independent of other potential confounding factors of socioeconomic level, marital status, religion and country of birth. Although the results must be interpreted with caution, the data are consistent with the hypothesis that this personality type may play a role in the clinical expression of colorectal cancer and merits further study.

Personality traits, health behavior, and risk for cancer

“…Aggressive hostility was related significantly (P Յ 0.018) to the risk for colon cancer. 37 Although that and other studies 2,3,33,35,36,38,40,[42][43][44] found significant associations between personality traits and the risk for cancer, many of those studies suffered from methodological problems, such as observation bias, 3,33,38 interviewer bias, 2,33,35,36,40 small populations, 2,33,35,37,40 and insufficient adjustment for confounders or intermediate factors. 37 .…”

“…[33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41] Temoshok investigated the Type C personality and the risk for cancer and suggested that individuals who are characterized by a Type C personality tend to be unassertive; they are compliant with authorities, appeasing, and cooperative; they do not express negative emotions; and they have an increased risk for cancer. 41 In another casecontrol study of the relation between aggressive hostility, phobia, religious fundamentalism, and the risk for colon cancer, among 61 men with colon cancer and matched controls who did not develop colon cancer, aggressive hostility was defined as a trait in those who experienced extreme episodes of anger more often than others.…”

Personality Traits, Anger and Psychiatric Symptoms Related to Quality of Life in Patients With Newly Diagnosed Digestive System Cancer

“…They showed that low scores of anger is normal but more important is the quality of anger that the patient expresses; which means, anger expression and anger control are positive to improve quality of life, and anger inhibition decreases it. Other study with 637 colorectal cancer patients showed that denial or repression of anger in patient's life story is a mark to this kind of cancer (24) .…”

Alexithymia, Immunity and Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia: A Pilot Study

“…This study assessed the possibility that personality traits may play a role in cancer development [2,3,5,7,10,12,24,25] and in a series of basic immunolog ical mechanisms apt to defend the organism from neoplasia, as suggested by many authors [16][17][18]. In fact there is a strong correlation between alexithymia and cervix dysplasia and between alexithymia and imbalance of the lymphocytes.…”