Can cardiorespiratory fitness moderate the negative effects of stress on coronary artery disease risk factors?

This investigation evaluated whether cardiorespiratory fitness was associated with a moderation of the negative effects of stress for coronary artery disease risk factors. Cardiorespiratory fitness; self-reported general stress and job stress; physiological risk factors of systolic and diastolic blood pressure, total cholesterol, and HDL cholesterol; and behavioral risk factors of Type A behavior pattern and smoking habits were collected on 412 male law enforcement officer volunteers. Partial correlational analyses between the stress measures and the risk factors suggested that cardiorespiratory fitness had no moderating effect on either the physiological or behavioral risk factors. However, for smokers, fitness may have slightly suppressed the stress-related amount of cigarettes smoked per day, although the change in correlation was small and may not have been meaningful. Since neither stress measure was associated with any physiological risk factors, the potential moderating effect of cardiorespiratory fitness was not optimally tested.