Behavioral and psychophysiological predictors of self-monitored 19 month blood pressure change in normotensives.

Selected demographic, behavioral and psychophysiological variables (sex of the subject, exercise, coffee and cigarette consumption, baroreceptor stimulation-dependent pain dampening, initial blood pressure, body mass index, daily stress rating, reactivity to mental stress as measured by change in stress rating and heart rate and blood pressure from resting to mental arithmetic conditions) were entered into a stepwise multiple-regression equation to predict changes of oscillometrically self-measured tonic blood pressure in 80 normotensives over a 19 month period. The prediction equation (r = 0.55) associated increases in diastolic blood pressure with baseline diastolic blood pressure, more baroreceptor stimulation-dependent pain inhibition, and less heart rate change during mental arithmetic. There were no significant predictors of systolic changes, and no sex differences. Results are discussed in terms of the learned model of hypertension.