The Affect of Hopelessness and the Development of Cancer

Abstract

Forty women were studied who were discovered on repeated routine examination to have cervical cytology suspicious for cancer. Although all subjects were asymptomatic for cervical disease all had cytological evidence of dysplasia. Biopsy revealed 14 subjects with carcinoma, in 13 of whom the disease was in situ in extent. The presence or absence of cancer was significantly predicted on the basis of presence or absence of interview criteria defined as a high hopelessness potential and/or recently experienced feelings of hopelessness. The so-called predisposition as well as psychological factors found by other investigators to differentiate women with cervical cancer from women with other forms of cancer or “no cancer” did not differentiate between the subjects in the present study.