A SPECIAL REPORT ON TRANSPORTATION : STRESSED OUT! : Bumper-to-Bumper Commuting Can Put a Dent in Your Health, Expert Says

Picture this. You’re bumping along the San Diego Freeway, your head bobbing to the beat of stop-and-go, when traffic mysteriously starts to loosen up a bit. The thought of easing up on your right foot brings a slight smile to your lips. You shift into fourth gear and you’re thinking about fifth.

And then, it happens. The inevitable. From out of nowhere, a car with a license plate like “SPR STUD” or worse yet, “BOY TOY,” flashes by on your right, its speed approaching that of a Sidewinder missile.

But it is not content to just zoom on by. Not on your life.

Instead, it veers left, coming within an inch of your headlights without so much as a turn signal to warn of a possible pile-up. But by the time that your breath returns, the offender is gone, zipping in front of yet another sucker and then on to the next.

Think about that moment.

How would you feel?

The short answer, most likely, is mad as hell. But it is the longer, more chronic answer that you should really worry about. And that answer is: stressed out .

Certainly, it is not surprising that driving the highways and byways of Orange County has long since ceased to be associated with anything resembling fun.

When, for example, was the last time that you said something like, “Hey, hon, how about taking a nice drive to Los Angeles? Maybe along the coast?”

Or how about: “You live in Huntington Beach? No problem, I’ll pick you up at 5:30 and we’ll drive to the airport together.”

So pleasant it is not. But perhaps you were unaware of just how dangerous the trauma of traffic can be.

UC Irvine associate professor Raymond Novaco, a psychologist whose work on commuter anxiety is nationally known, says that for some people, constantly slogging through traffic can be as stressful as, say, being audited by the IRS, living next to a bus terminal or undergoing an emergency root canal.

This can produce the kind of chronic stress that has been implicated in everything from heart attacks to gastroenteritis to skin rashes to insomnia to boorishness. Add to that such wild cards as the use of cigarettes, coffee and alcohol, and a congested commute to the office can be as treacherous as skinny dipping in the Love Canal.

“Everyone knows that it is stressful,” Novaco says of the perils of clogged roadways. “What we are trying to do is identify those individuals who are most at risk.”

With that in mind, Novaco and his associates at UC Irvine are in the process of updating and expanding a study they did 10 years ago that examined the stressful effects of commuting on 100 employees of Parker-Hannifin Corp. and Allergan Pharmaceuticals in Irvine.

What that research showed, Novaco says, is how insidiously commuter stress can worm its way into our hearts and minds.

“People can adjust, but every adaptation has its cost,” he says. “Baseline blood pressure goes up, mood may be negatively affected, concentration may be diminished and frustration tolerance can be impaired.

“What we have observed are cumulative effects, chronic effects. Generally, the longer the distance of the commute, the higher the blood pressure and the more negative the mood.”

And if you think that is bad news, keep in mind that those findings are from a decade ago. The news this year, according to a Times Orange County poll, is that roadway stress is greater than ever.

The poll showed that on a typical workday, a high percentage of motorists dread their drive time to the office and that the people most affected by stress come from among the ranks of commuters spending more than an hour on the road.

In all, 43% of the poll respondents said that their commute to work is somewhat or very stressful, with residents of north and south Orange County, 52% and 43% respectively, more anxiety prone than the others. Of people who spend an hour or more on the road, 68% reported feeling stress. (The poll, conducted by Irvine-based Mark Baldassare & Associates in late August, has an error margin of 4%.)

Novaco also expects that the stress quotient of the volunteers in his current study will zoom past his earlier figures, a reflection of navigating even more crowded Orange County freeways, and notes that the drive from the office, when commuters are joined by the likes of shoppers, tourists and whoever, may be the most stressful of all.

“I think there will be more arguments (at home), with a lowering of satisfaction and tranquility,” Novaco says.

Another authority in this area is California Highway Patrol Officer Mike Lundquist, who already has done plenty of informal research during his 15 years of cruising and perusing the mean streets of Orange County.

“The simple additional time wasted on the freeway adds to anxiety, and the longer you have to sit and wait, the more anxious you become,” Lundquist says.

“People deal with it in different ways. Some of them drive on the shoulders, honk their horns and do various other things, like brandishing a handgun or flipping their fingers at people. All of these things are fairly common aspects of tension created by the freeway.”

And Lundquist, who says “it’s been going on like this for a long time,” thinks that freeway frustration is only going to get worse.

“I think people just have to expect it,” he says. “We’ve got to slow down our way of life. Unfortunately, other Californians just keep charging ahead.”

That is not to say, however, that traffic tension doesn’t discriminate. It does.

Personality types, for one, play a major role in determining just how freaked out one is likely to get on the freeway.

Novaco says that Type A’s, for example, those hard-charging types who like to be in control, often do better on longer commutes because they tend to maneuver better, getting to their destinations by the fastest, most efficient route. They also tend to think about what they are going to do once they get to the office, which helps to keep their mind off the immediate stress of just getting there.

Novaco says that Type Bs, those more laid-back types who would never dream of using a car pool lane under false pretenses, tend to let the stresses of long commutes get to them. They feel out of control, he says, and therefore more stressed out.

He adds, however, that the reverse appears to be true for medium-distance commutes, say between 10 and 15 miles, where surface streets are often used. Stopping for traffic lights, wayward pedestrians and turning cars tends to irritate Type A’s more than it does Type Bs, perhaps because these are things that even Type A’s can’t control.

Needless to say, none of this is etched in asphalt. Some people, or so they say, even like communing with their neighbors and themselves in that bubble of soulful insulation that is the automobile.

“Some people say they welcome the commute,” says environmental psychologist Daniel Stokols, the director of UC Irvine’s social ecology program and a research associate of Novaco.

“There are some individuals that regard it as a transition between work and home, sort of a winding-down time, especially if they have a nice stereo or a nice car.”

Which brings up another adage that particularly stressed-out commuters should be aware of: There are things you can do to change your commuting destiny.

Buy a luxury car. Envelope yourself in stereophonic sound. Get a car phone. Turn on the air conditioner. Move to Montana.

And, failing all of the above, there is always something to be said for cultivating that wonderfully multipurposed trait known as will power.

Here’s how one of the harried hordes among us, Tom Williams, McDonnell Douglas’ senior manager of media relations in Huntington Beach, makes it work for him.

“If I’m in a situation where I am going to be late for an appointment, I get really tensed out quickly,” Williams confides.

“I try to avoid that, but the few times that I have been in that situation, what I do is I get extremely angry and tense, and then, I just abandon myself and say, ‘Look, this is life.’ I try not to let it creep up on me.”

But even Williams concedes: “God, I hate to be in that situation.”

COMMUTING AND STRESS

On a typical day, how stressful is your commute to work? Percent Finding Commute Stressful All: 43% By Commute Time 0-9 minutes: 11 10-30 minutes: 44% 31-60 minutes: 64% 61+ minutes: 68% By Region North County: 52% West County: 36% Central County: 39% South County: 43% By Rush-Hour Freeway Use Drive rush-hour: 61% Don’t drive rush-hour: 28%

On a typical day, how stressful is your commute to work? Very: 11% Somewhat: 32% Not at all: 57%

Source: Times Orange County Poll, September, 1988