Psychosocial Predictors of Mental and Physical Health: HIV

随着研究人员试图了解人们对生活压力心理适应能力的个体差异，人格特征已经成为面对逆境时持续幸福感的重要预测因素。大多数关于人格特征的研究都是在健康的、调整得很好的样本中进行的，对弱势群体的了解很少。我们感兴趣的是艾滋病毒携带者的特征，并将他们与普通人群进行比较。 我们对主观的健康观念和脆弱性感兴趣。在最近的一项研究中，我们考察了人格特征对自我评估健康的四个单项衡量标准中平均水平和年龄趋势的影响：一般评分、与同龄人的比较、与过去健康的比较以及对未来健康的期望。社区居住参与者(N=1,683)在长达19年的时间里完成了7,474项自我评估健康评估。在分层线性模型分析中，与年龄相关的下降在四个健康项目中有所不同。在各年龄组中，高神经质和低责任心、低外向和低开放性与较差的健康评级有关，在四个健康项目上存在显著差异。此外，高度神经质预示着涉及时间比较的健康评级将出现更大幅度的下降。我们考虑了人格特征和自我评估健康之间的联系背后的机制的理论含义。 在单独的研究中，我们研究了个性在炎症中的作用，我们发现高度神经质和低责任感与IL-6、CRP和血细胞计数有关。这项研究强调了心理特征与炎症标志物的关系，并与疾病进展相关。

As researchers seek to understand individual differences in peoples psychological resilience to life stressors, personality traits have emerged as important predictors of sustained well-being in the face of adversity. Most research on personality traits has been conducted in healthy, well-adjusted samples and little is known about vulnerable populations. We are interested in traits that characterize people living with HIV, and compare them to the general population. We are interested in subjective health perceptions and vulnerabilities. In a recent study we examined the influence of personality traits on mean levels and age trends in four single-item measures of self-rated health: General rating, comparison to age peers, comparison to past health, and expectations for future health. Community-dwelling participants (N=1,683) completed 7,474 self-rated health assessments over a period of up to 19-years. In hierarchical linear modeling analyses, age-associated declines differed across the four health items. Across age groups, high neuroticism and low conscientiousness, low extraversion, and low openness were associated with worse health ratings, with notable differences across the four health items. Furthermore, high neuroticism predicted steeper declines in health ratings involving temporal comparisons. We consider theoretical implications regarding the mechanisms behind associations among personality traits and self-rated health In separate studies we have examined the role of personality in inflammation, and we found that high neuroticism and low conscientiousness are related to IL-6, CRP, and withe blood cell counts. This research highlight the relation of psychological traits with inflammatory markers and are relevant to disease progression.