Trait Dominance and Cardiovascular Functioning During Social Stress

Cardiovascular reactivity (CVR) to stress has been found to be an important indicator of future ill-health, and individual differences in personality have been posited to explain disparities in outcomes. Dominance is associated with forceful persons who desire hierarchy in social interactions. This study investigated dominance and CVR during social or asocial stressors. Sixty-one women, categorised as low, moderate or high in dominance using the Jackson Personality Research Form completed a Social or Asocial Stressor while undergoing cardiovascular measurement during Baseline, Stressor and Recovery phases. A 3 × 2 × 3 ANCOVA revealed a significant Phase by Stressor by Dominance interaction for systolic blood pressure (SBP). Women with lower and moderate dominance – but not women with higher dominance – exhibited greater SBP responses to stress in the Social compared to Asocial condition. No significant difference was found for women with higher dominance, indicative of blunted SBP during the Social Stressor. During Recovery, women with lower dominance had marginally elevated SBP in the Social compared to Asocial condition. The current study extends prior knowledge of the association between dominance and CVR, such that greater dominance was associated with blunted SBP and lower dominance was associated with attenuated recovery to social stress.