Do Worry and Brooding Predict Health Behaviors? A Daily Diary Investigation
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Do Worry and Brooding Predict Health Behaviors? A Daily Diary Investigation F. Clancy 1
&
D. B. O’Connor 1 & A. Prestwich 1
# The Author(s) 2020
Abstract Background Meta-analyses have reported associations between perseverative cognition (both worry and brooding) and increased engagement in health-risk behaviors, poorer sleep, and poorer physiological health outcomes. Method Using a daily diary design, this study investigated the within- and between-person relationships between state and trait perseverative cognition and health behaviors (eating behavior, physical activity, alcohol consumption, and sleep) both crosssectionally and prospectively. Participants (n = 273, 93% students, Mage = 20.2, SD = 4.11, 93% female) completed morning and evening diaries across 7 consecutive days. Results Multilevel modeling analyses revealed that, cross-sectionally, higher levels of state worry were associated with more time spent sitting and higher levels of state brooding predicted less daily walking. Conclusion Worry and brooding may represent useful intervention targets for improving inactivity and walking levels, respectively. Keywords Worry . Brooding . Rumination . Stress . Health . Behavior
Introduction It is well established that stress can impact health directly through autonomic and neuroendocrine processes but also, indirectly, by influencing health behaviors. For example, stress has been found to be associated with an increased proinflammatory response [1, 2] which can increase susceptibility to diseases of chronic inflammation, with research supporting links between inflammatory diseases ranging from diabetes [3] to cancer [4]. In terms of the indirect pathway, research Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s12529-020-09898-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * F. Clancy [email protected] D. B. O’Connor [email protected] A. Prestwich [email protected] 1
Faculty of Medicine and Health, School of Psychology, The University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
supports associations between stress and poorer sleep outcomes [5], greater alcohol consumption [6, 7], unhealthy eating behaviors in adults and children [8–12], and less physical activity [13]. In turn, these behaviors have been linked with poorer health outcomes including increased rates of morbidity and mortality [14–17].
Perseverative Cognition, Health, and Health Behaviors Perseverative cognition [18] is defined as the cognitive representation of past stressful events (rumination) or feared future events (worry). The perseverative cognition hypothesis [18] proposes that, in such instances where the physical stressor is absent, the cognitive representation alone can induce the physiological stress response. It is suggested that, when stress is perseverated upon, the damaging physiological activation associated with stress is also protracted, thus increasing susceptibility to stress-related ill-health. Rumination is a key type of per
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