Developments to Watch

GET IT OFF YOUR CHEST--IT'S GOOD FOR YOUR HEART

A blow-up now and then between married couples could be good for the wife's health, say researchers at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. In a study of 192 couples, psychosocial epidemiologist Mara Julius found that if both husband and wife suppressed anger, the mortality rate for women from heart attacks was 11%. This dropped to 7% when only the husband expressed anger. When both "let it out," the female death rate was zero.

Julius studied traditional couples, in which the wife is the homemaker and the husband the breadwinner. She says that sulkers, holding in their anger, have the highest risk of death. That's because these people also tend to have such unhealthy habits as smoking or alcohol abuse. And, she says, suppressing strong feelings could provoke a biochemical imbalance that affects the cardiovascular system. Anger-suppressing husbands were about twice as likely to die of heart attacks as husbands who let out their emotions.EDITED BY FLEUR TEMPLETON