Personality Factors or Behavior Patterns

Abstract

In medicine it is often disputed whether the personality or behavior pattern of an individual has anything to do with the causation of organic disease. The reason is partly that the possible contributing behavior is much further in the past than the usual risk factors and therefore the connection is difficult to make, and partly that the physiological mechanisms linking the two are often obscure or must be observed for many years. Nevertheless, many believe that personality or behavior traits are critical in the chain of events which leads from excessive stress to the development of specific stress-related disorders. When life events cluster and the level-of-stress score is high, these personality or lifelong behavior patterns are important determinants of how that stress is likely to manifest itself.