Smoking as a Risk Factor for Lung Cancer and Cardiac Infarct as Mediated by Psychosocial Variables

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Abstract
In 1965-1966, a prospective psychosomatic investigation was started with 1353 relatively old inhabitants of the village of Crvenka, Yugoslavia. The relevance of smoking for the incidence of lung cancer and cardiac infarct was studied. The relevance of smoking is reduced, but not eliminated, by introducing psychosocial control variables, suggesting that the latter have direct influences both on smoking and the diseases. The relevance of smoking interacts very strongly with psychosocial background conditions: it is nearly reduced to 0 when the latter are favorable, and is correspondingly high when they are unfavorable. The results are also interpreted in biochemical terms.
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