Giving to Others and the Association Between Stress and Mortality

We sought to test the hypothesis that providing help to others predicts a reduced association between stress and mortality. We examined data from participants (n = 846) in a study in the Detroit, Michigan, area. Participants completed baseline interviews that assessed past-year stressful events and...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:American journal of public health (1971) 2013-09, Vol.103 (9), p.1649-1655
Main Authors: POULIN, Michael J, BROWN, Stephanie L, DILLARD, Amanda J, SMITH, Dylan M
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Age Factors
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Biological and medical sciences
Couples
Epidemiology
Female
General aspects
Health Status
Helping Behavior
Hormones
Humans
Hypotheses
Laboratories
Life Change Events
Male
Medical research
Medical sciences
Michigan - epidemiology
Middle Aged
Miscellaneous
Mortality
Older people
Physiology
Proportional Hazards Models
Prospective Studies
Psychology
Public health
Public health. Hygiene
Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine
Research and Practice
Risk Factors
Social isolation
Social support
Stress
Studies
Variables
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Summary:We sought to test the hypothesis that providing help to others predicts a reduced association between stress and mortality. We examined data from participants (n = 846) in a study in the Detroit, Michigan, area. Participants completed baseline interviews that assessed past-year stressful events and whether the participant had provided tangible assistance to friends or family members. Participant mortality and time to death was monitored for 5 years by way of newspaper obituaries and monthly state death-record tapes. When we adjusted for age, baseline health and functioning, and key psychosocial variables, Cox proportional hazard models for mortality revealed a significant interaction between helping behavior and stressful events (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.58; P < .05; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.35, 0.98). Specifically, stress did not predict mortality risk among individuals who provided help to others in the past year (HR = 0.96; 95% CI = 0.79, 1.18), but stress did predict mortality among those who did not provide help to others (HR = 1.30; P < .05; 95% CI = 1.05, 1.62). Helping others predicted reduced mortality specifically by buffering the association between stress and mortality.
ISSN:0090-0036
1541-0048
DOI:10.2105/ajph.2012.300876