Abstract
Cardiovascular disease has become the leading cause of death in the developed world. Increasingly inflammation is being targeted as a contributor driving the progression of these diseases and is directly implicated in the development of atherosclerosis. The type of persistent chronic inflammation associated with CVD is the result of maladaptive stress responses. Behaviors and states that have an effect on this response, beyond traditional risk factors, are coming under increasing attention as potential means to mediate the pathogenesis of CVD. Of these, engagement in leisure activities is a novel and strong candidate. As such, this investigation was conducted to test the hypothesis that individuals who reported engaging in more leisure activities would experience a lower inflammatory response to a psychosocial stressor.\r A sample of n=18 young adults were screened to be healthy and exposed to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST). Participants (14 male; 8 Caucasian) had a mean age of 21.86 years (SD=4.30) and a mean BMI of 24.28 kg/m2 (SD=3.62). Inflammation, is indicated by Interleukin-6 (IL-6), was measured at baseline just before the TSST as well as 30 and 120 minutes after stress exposure. Leisure Engagement was assessed using the Pittsburgh Enjoyable Activities Test (PEAT).\r As shown in Figure 1, IL-6 concentrations increased over time with highest levels two hours after stress exposure revealing a significant time effect (F1.095=18.27; p=0.003). To test whether self-reported leisure activities were related with IL-6 responses to stress, we computed a repeated measures ANCOVA including PEAT as a covariate. Results revealed a significant time by PEAT interaction (F1.12,17.92=4.42; p=0.046). To confirm this relationship and test for directionality, we tested for bivariate correlations between PEAT and the change in IL-6 as a measure of the IL-6 response to stress. As shown in Figure 2 there was a significant inverse correlation, with higher self-reported leisure activity predicting lower IL-6 stress responses (r=-0.49; p=0.040).