Recently, a fellow reporter told me about a reader who called, complaining about a story. The reader managed to spew a bunch of caustic nonsense including name calling. Of course he didn’t leave his name or phone number. My friend was bothered by this.

I refuse to be bothered by such callers. They’re not worth my time.

We reporters stand by our stories by putting our names and contact information at the top of them. And we’re always happy to hear readers’ opinions even when they disagree with us as long as their tone is civil and their opinion is well argued. Not so with those who resort to name-calling, nasty rhetoric and then don’t leave names or numbers.

I told my fellow reporter about my theory: People like that are emotionally stunted and usually lead miserable lives. Their anger poisons their minds and their bodies.

Then I did what any good reporter would do: Googled the words “anger” and “health” to see if I was right. Here’s what I found.

The American Psychological Association says “people who are constantly putting others down, criticizing everything, and making cynical comments haven’t learned how to constructively express their anger. Not surprisingly, they aren’t likely to have many successful relationships.”

And last year, Science Daily reported how researchers found that men with high trait anger scores have 1.7 times greater odds for developing hypertension than those with low or moderate scores. High trait anger scores were also linked with a 90 percent increase in the risk of progression to coronary heart disease in prehypertensive men.