Paternal work stress and prolonged time to pregnancy.
OBJECTIVE
The aim of this study was to explore an association between psychosocial stress at work in married men and their spouses' prolonged time to pregnancy (TTP).


METHODS
All married male workers of a large Korean petrochemical enterprise and their wives fulfilling the selection criteria were included. Main selection criteria were lack of use of contraceptives and experienced pregnancy in recent past. Data were available from 322 couples. Psychosocial stress at work was measured by the effort-reward imbalance questionnaire. Prolonged TTP was measured by the "TTP questionnaire".


RESULTS
After adjustment for confounding effects of demographic and life-style characteristics and benzene exposure, delayed TTP, defined by frequency of first-cycle pregnancy, was associated with one standard deviation (SD) increase of the effort-reward ratio in the chronically stressed group of married men (OR = 0.47; 95% CI = 0.22-0.99) in logistic regression analysis. A similar, but somewhat weaker effect, was found for the overall group (OR = 0.67; 95% CI = 0.47-0.94).


CONCLUSIONS
Paternal stress at work, as measured by effort-reward imbalance, seemed to be associated with a decreased number of conceptions in the first menstrual cycle.
Lee
Mi-Sun
MS
Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, School of Public Health and Institute of Health and Environment, Seoul National University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
Paek
Domyung
D
Eum
Ki-Do
KD
Siegrist
Johannes
J
Li
Jian
J
Lee
Hye-Eun
HE
Cho
Sung-Il
SI
D000328:Adult; D002617:Chemical Industry; D015986:Confounding Factors, Epidemiologic; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007248:Infertility, Male / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology*; D007588:Job Satisfaction; D007723:Korea / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D009784:Occupational Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology*; D016272:Occupational Health / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D018812:Paternal Exposure / Q000009:adverse effects*; D010578:Petroleum; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012201:Reward; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013997:Time Factors; D055815:Young Adult
D010578:Petroleum