more likely to respond to frustrating situations with anger and hostility
(Bettencourt, Talley, Benjamin, & Valentine, 2006). As you will see, it ’s this
third component that soon became the most significant.
Personality researchers have compared Type A and Type B people on a
wide variety of behaviors, including driving habits, study habits, reactions tofailure, and reactions to persuasive messages. One particularly interesting hy-
pothesis to come out of this work explains differences in Type A and Type B be-
havior in terms of a motivation for control. That is, achievement striving, timeurgency, and hostility reflect the Type A individuals ’desire to exercise effective
control over the people and situations they encounter. Type A ’s are more likely
than Type B ’s to dominate a group discussion (Yarnold, Mueser, & Grimm,
1985). Type A ’s are less likely to give up control over a task, even to someone
who might do a better job (Strube, Berry, & Moergen, 1985). Type A ’s are
also more likely than Type B ’s to want something after being told they can ’t
have it (Rhodewalt & Comer, 1982; Rhodewalt & Davison, 1983).
Naturally, researchers have looked at whether Type A or Type B indivi-
duals achieve more. Numerous laboratory studies find Type A participants
typically outperform Type B ’s on achievement tasks. One reason for this dif-
ference is that Type A ’s tend to set higher goals for themselves (Ward &
Eisler, 1987). But what really fires them up is competition. What greaterthreat to a Type A ’s sense of control than to be told there can be but one
winner? Their blood pressure and heart rate go up when simply being told
they are competing against another person (Lyness, 1993). Not only do Type
A’s respond to competition, they seem to be attracted to it. Type A partici-
pants in one study were more confident in their ability to do well in a game
when told they were competing against another participant (Gotay, 1981).
Researchers also find differences in academic performance between Type A
and Type B college students. Type A students tend to take more classes than
Type B students and expect to do better in those classes (Ovcharchyn,Johnson, & Petzel, 1981). One investigation found that Type A students re-
ceive more academic honors and participate in more extracurricular activities
than Type B students (Glass, 1977). This study also revealed that Type A stu-dents participate in more sports, receive more athletic awards, and participate
in more social activities in high school than their Type B classmates.
Hostility and Health
As the medical researchers who first identified the trait anticipated, early stud-
ies found Type A was a good predictor of heart disease (Cooper, Detre, &
Weiss, 1981). Type A men in one 8 1/2-year study had more than twicethe incidence of heart disease than Type B men (Rosenman et al., 1975). In
another investigation, Type A was a better predictor of heart attacks than
cholesterol level or cigarette smoking (Jenkins, Zyzanski, & Rosenman,1976). Naturally, findings like these caught the attention of the medical com-
munity as well as the media. Not only could physicians do a better job of pre-
dicting heart attacks, but the findings hinted at lifestyle changes that mightreduce the risk of heart disease.
However, as is often the case, results from subsequent studies found that
the connection between Type A and health is more complex than the originalType A, Hostility and Health 195