Psychological attributes of women who develop breast cancer: A controlled study

Abstract

As part of an interdisciplinary study of breast cancer, psychological investigation of a consecutive series 160 women admitted to hospital for breast tumour biopsy was carried out by means of detailed structured interviews and standard tests. Interviews and testing were conducted on the day before operation, without knowledge of the provisional diagnosis. Information obtained from patients was verified in almost all cases by separate interviews with husbands or close relatives. Present results are based on statistical comparisons between 69 patients found at operation to have breast cancer and a control group comprising the remaining 91 patients with benign breast disease. Our principal finding was a significant association between the diagnosis of breast cancer and a behaviour pattern, persisting throughout adult life, of abnormal release of emotions. This abnormality was, in most cases, extreme suppression of anger and, in patients over 40, extreme suppression of other feelings. Extreme expression of emotions, though much less common, also occurred in a higher proportion of cancer patients than controls. Previous reports of correlations between breast cancer and extraversion, previous stress and depression were not confirmed.