Diana Kwon in Knowable Magazine:
About two millennia ago, the Greek physicians Hippocrates and Galen suggested that melancholia — depression brought on by an excess of “black bile” in the body — contributed to cancer. Since then, scores of researchers have investigated the association between cancer and the mind, with some going as far as to suggest that some people have a cancer-prone or “Type C” personality.
Most researchers now reject the idea of a cancer-prone personality. But they still haven’t settled what influence stress and other psychological factors can have on the onset and progression of cancer. More than a hundred epidemiological studies — some involving tens of thousands of people — have linked depression, low socioeconomic status and other sources of psychological stress to an increase in cancer risk, and to a worse prognosis for people who already have the disease. However, this literature is full of contradictions, especially in the first case.
More here.
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