The aim of this research was to determine the influence of personality traits on the anticipatory stress vulnerability and effectiveness of preventive coping intervention in a real-life stressful context. Results showed that individuals with high scores of neuroticism’s (N+), low scores of conscientiousness (C−), or low scores of extraversions (E−) exhibited elevated anticipatory stress markers. Interestingly, openness was found to positively predict the effectiveness of relaxing breathing and biofeedback coping interventions.
As expected, results revealed that neuroticism was associated with worsened anticipatory stress vulnerability (i.e., N− resilience, N+ vulnerability). Accordingly, higher neuroticism score predicted elevated psychological and physiological anticipatory stress responses. Neuroticism is a higher-order personality trait that accounts for a tendency to experience emotional instability, distress and negative emotions 45,46. We postulated that these tendencies led to a greater level of subjective stress, which in turn is manifested by elevated cardiac reactivity. Others studies found that N+ is linked to an increase of vulnerability during the confrontation with the stressor 13,15,16 and with the long-term development of stress related-pathologies (e.g., burnout, depression) 47. Present results therefore represent a new step in the overall understanding of the relationships between neuroticism and vulnerability with early stress anticipation, acute stress and mental disorders.
Our findings also revealed that extraversion was inversely associated with anticipatory stress (i.e., E− vulnerability, E + resilience). Lower scores for extraversion predicted elevated psychological and physiological anticipatory stress responses. This result is consistent with previous findings reporting higher subjective stress and cortisol level in E− individuals during the confrontation with a standardized stressor (mental arithmetic, anger recall, Trier Social Stress Test) 9,10,15. Extraversion is a higher-order personality trait that accounts for an individual’s tendency to experience positive emotions and to be sociable 45,46. In our experiment, we hypothesized that the tendency to experience positive emotion induced a more positive perception of the situation, which turns into a lower level of psychophysiological stress. It is also possible that the tendency to be sociable resulted in a lowering of general anxiety and specific anticipatory stress. Indeed, social support is one of the main strategies used for coping or regulating cognition in response to stressors, as assessed by the Brief Cope Scale Inventory (social support, avoidance, positive thinking, problem solving) 48.
While not predicted, our results also showed that consciousness was negatively associated with psychological anticipatory stress (i.e., C− vulnerability, C+ resilience). Literature reveals that individuals with a higher conscientiousness trait use problem-focused coping methods 49,50,51. In the present work, the stressful situation was a multimodal complex task, where a high level of competence was required to succeed. It seems likely that C+ individuals focusing on problem-solving may have the higher level of theorical resources necessary to deal with certain aspects of the critical situation. Similarly, C+ individuals have an increased tendency to self-discipline and responsibility 45,46. As an explanatory track, we hypothesized that a high-level of self-discipline might contribute to lowered levels of anticipatory stress notably by allowing individuals to have control over the situation. Taken together, our results revealed that individuals with a high neuroticism trait, and/or a low extraversion or consciousness trait, are the most vulnerable to an ecological anticipatory stress, and confirm the importance for assessing these traits for understanding stress responses.
For the first time, this study evaluated the influence of personality traits on the effectiveness of relaxing breathing and cardiac biofeedback interventions. Our data revealed that individuals with high scores of openness (O+) achieved better cardiac coherence scores. This is in agreement with Peciuliene and collaborators (2015) who found that individuals with high openness scores presented more physiological benefits (i.e., lowering physiological arousal) following biofeedback training based on skin conductance 30. Others studies further revealed that openness was positively associated with perceived coping ability, notably during a stressful event, and greater level of control over the task 7,52. As both coping interventions tested here relied on breathing-control, it seems possible that the openness trait led to more effective practice of these new exercises, which in turn resulted in efficient stress reduction 53. Furthermore, individuals with high openness trait are curious by nature 45,46, which might make them spontaneously more interested in trying a new exercise. Future studies exploring various interventions are necessary to determine which technique is the most efficient coping method for N+, E− and C− individuals. Previous findings suggested that stress reduction through meditation is a promising alternative for N+ individuals 36, while cerebral stimulation might be more appropriate for E− individuals 54. Comparing these alternative coping strategies using the same stressful paradigm will be necessary to confirm the specificity of the intervention-trait relationships. These studies are needed before offering preventive personalized treatment and to prevent the development of stress related disorders.
As a final practical observation, this study explored ecological stress within a medical professional context. In addition to the usual decrease of well-being and health, high levels of stress in physicians are associated with poor quality of care and increased risks of incidents 55,56. Identifying a physician’s personality traits associated with anticipatory stress is relevant to estimate these professional risks. Our results showed that N+, E− and C− anaesthesiologists and critical residents are vulnerable to anticipatory stress. Previous studies repeatedly reported that N+ and E− influenced level of school and job stress, and are associated with the risk of burnout 47,57,58. Together, these results support that N+ and E− anaesthetists are at great risk of both immediate and long-term specific professional stress, and should be prioritized to early stress coping training. Our findings suggest that relaxing breathing and cardiac biofeedback might contribute to increase scores of cardiac coherences in all profiles (even in N+ and E+ individuals), thus these interventions might be efficient to reduce physiological stress during the anticipation of a stressful critical care event. Replication of the present findings in other daily real-life settings (e.g. job interview, sport competition) will help to generalize our conclusions to other contexts. As another perspective, the characterisation of anticipatory stress could be enhanced by other physiological markers, such as salivary cortisol to detect the activation of the hypothalamo-pituary-adrenal axis.
To conclude, our results showed that individuals with a high neuroticism trait and a low extraversion trait are the most sensitive to anticipatory psychophysiological stress. Moreover, those with high openness to experience trait benefited more extensively from brief coping interventions. These data encourage the assessment of personality in identifying ecological stress vulnerability and offering individualized stress management training including relaxing breathing and cardiac biofeedback. Practically, these data might contribute to understanding in greater detail how to protect individuals from chronic stress.