Life-events and mood as predictors of the common cold

One hundred subjects volunteered to take part in a 'diary-type' study in which they were to check, at the end of each day, a variety of items dealing with events, mood states and health. A subsample was selected who had both provided several weeks of data and had, during that time, suffered at least one common cold episode. A lagged relationship between events and the onset of cold episodes was found. Desirable events ('uplifts') were found to decrease significantly in frequency during a period commencing four days prior to cold onset. There was a less significant tendency for the number of undesirable events ('hassles') to rise during this same period. Subjects' ratings also indicated that they had been feeling more angry, tense and sceptical during this period. It is argued that the lagged relationship, the use of subjects as their own controls, and the partly replicatory nature of the study, give strong support to psycho-immunological hypotheses concerning links between life-events and illness. Individual item analysis suggests that fluctuations in perceived intimacy, social support and self-esteem may be important mediators of the effects.