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Psychosomatic Medicine 62:684-692 (2000)
© 2000 American Psychosomatic Society

ORIGINAL ARTICLES

Anger, Harassment, and Cardiovascular Reactivity Among Chinese and Indian Men in Singapore

George D. Bishop, PhD and Gary Robinson, BA

From the National University of Singapore.

Address reprint requests to: George D. Bishop, PhD, Department of Social Work and Psychology, National University of Singapore, 11 Law Link, Singapore 117570. Email: swkgb{at}nus.edu.sg

OBJECTIVE: This experiment examined psychological and cardiovascular responses to experimental harassment among Chinese and Indian men in Singapore who differed in levels of dispositional anger.

METHODS: Eighty-four Chinese and Indian men participated in a laboratory experiment on cardiovascular reactivity in which mood was rated and heart rate and blood pressure were measured during computer tasks in which they were either harassed or allowed to complete the tasks without interruption.

RESULTS: Comparison of systolic reactivity to harassment and nonharassment indicated, as expected, that reactivity was greater after harassment. Furthermore, a significant race by dispositional anger by harassment effect was obtained for systolic reactivity that indicated different patterns of reactivity for Chinese and Indian participants. In the absence of harassment, Chinese participants showed low systolic reactivity regardless of their level of dispositional anger, whereas systolic reactivity increased as a function of dispositional anger when they were harassed. For Indians, however, systolic reactivity was a positive function of dispositional anger both when they were harassed and not harassed.

CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest stronger cardiovascular reactivity to stress among Indian than among Chinese men. This seems to be particularly true for Indians high in dispositional anger.

Key Words: anger • cardiovascular reactivity • stress • Chinese • Indians • Singapore

Abbreviations: CHD = coronary heart disease; CVR = cardiovascularreactivity; DA = dispositional anger; ECG =electrocardiogram; STAXI = State-Trait Anger ExpressionInventory.






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