Stress, personality and illness: The move from generality to specificity in current research trends

This paper identifies a shift in emphasis from the general to the more specific view of interactions between stress and illness, personality and illness and the associated role played by social support. Within this framework it examines research with diverse stressors, psychophysiological reactions to them, proposed connecting pathways, protective and harmful aspects of personality dispositions and the effects of social support. It acknowledges the extraordinary advances made in this area to date and concludes that further progress within a biopsychosocial model will involve prospective research designs employing more sophisticated measures of the relevant psychological constructs, and immune parameters