The relationship of coronary-prone behavior pattern to the health of college students at varying levels of recent life change

This paper examines the relationship of coronary-prone behavior pattern, magnitude of recent life change and subsequently reported illnesses in a sample of 145 healthy young adults. Subjects with extreme Type A behavior pattern reported significantly more life changes in the previous year than did other subjects but they reported no more illness in the subsequent surveillance period. Extreme Type A subjects as a group showed no association between recent life changes and illness whereas there was a significant association in subjects without this pattern. The introduction of sex as a control variable does not alter these relationships except for extreme Type A females in whom the magnitude of life change is negatively and significantly correlated with reported illness.