Making a Bad Situation Worse: Race, Poor Health Behaviors, and Daily Family Stressor Reactivity

Prior research posits that for African Americans, engaging in poor health behaviors (PHBs), such as smoking or drinking, buffers the negative effects of stressful life events. This study explored how PHBs exacerbate (double jeopardy) or buffer reactivity to daily family stressors among African Americans and European Americans (N = 1931) ages 34–84 from the National Study of Daily Experiences (NSDE II). During 8 days of telephone interviews, respondents reported on family stressors, health behaviors (number of cigarettes and alcoholic beverages), affect, and physical symptoms. For African Americans affective reactivity to family arguments was exacerbated on days they smoked more than usual and on days they drank more than usual. In contrast, drinking buffered African Americans' reactivity to network events (i.e., events that happen to a family member). For African Americans, drinking mitigated the negative effects of network stressors, while exacerbating reactivity for family arguments, underscoring the significance of stressor context.