Abstract

The influence of personality factors on coronary heart disease(CHD) is one of the most fascinating issues in the field of psychology and behavioral medicine. In this study, to find the personality factors which may be related to CHD, 43 coronary artery patients were compared with 42 orthopaedic patients(control group) in various psychological measures-Jenkins Activity Survey, Eysenck Type A Scale, Hardiness Scale, Cook-Medley Hostility Scale, and the scales which were used in the Framingham Study(emotional lability, tension, anxiety symptoms, and anger symptoms scale). The data of the two groups were analyzed by means of the statistical methods such as t-test, correlation analysis, factor analysis, and discriminant function analysis. Results indicate that the core elements of the coronary-prone personality are 'neuroticism' factor and 'time-urgency / anger-out' factor which is one of subfactors of the Type A behavior pattern(TABP), and that the former is the more important of the two. And it is indicated that 'job involvement / activity' factor, one of subcomponents of the TABP, is not related to CHD. When all subjects were divided into the four groups on the basis of their JAS scores(divided at the median) and their Hardiness Scores(divided at the median, too), high ratio of CHD patients was found only in the low hardiness / Type A group. Therefore it is suggested that all the Type As are not coronary-prone, but that only the low hardiness / Type As are the 'true Type As' who are coronary-prone.