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'Life force' linked to body's ability to withstand stress
Date:6/17/2009

life ("I'm bursting with energy; my life is fast-paced"). Other dimensions of extraversion, such as sensation-seeking, have also been proposed.

While the first two extrovert qualities were not found to track with inflammation, the current study found increases in "dispositional activity" came with statistically significant decreases in IL-6 (p = .001). P values measure the weight that should be attributed to a finding, with values less than .05 usually deemed significant.

In the current study, a patient's degree of extroversion was determined by standard tests, including the NEO Five-Factor Inventory, an instrument based on the Five Factor Model. The study found that the difference between the 84th percentile of dispositional activity and the 16th translated roughly into a 1.29 picogram increase in IL-6 per milliliter of blood.

Those findings took on meaning when comparisons revealed that, for both white and minority women, the difference between high and low dispositional energy was enough to shift IL-6 levels above 3.19 pg/ml, the threshold established by a large, epidemiological study (Harris et al., 1999) over which five-year mortality risk was found to double.

"If this aspect of personality drives inflammation, dispositional energy and engagement with life may confer a survival advantage," Chapman said. "But we don't know if low dispositional activity is causing inflammation, or inflammation is taking its toll on people by reducing these personality tendencies, so we must be cautious in our interpretation of this association."

The findings recall an idea described as early as 1911 by French philosopher Henri Bergson that he called lan vitale or ''life force," according to the authors. This aspect of adult personality may be linked to childhood temperament as well. Some babies are very relaxed, others active. Activity level may reflect a fundamental, biologically-based energy reserve, although no one has explained
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Contact: Greg Williams
Greg_Williams@urmc.rochester.edu
585-273-1757
University of Rochester Medical Center
Source:Eurekalert

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