"Approach and avoidance coping responses among older problem and nonproblem drinkers": Clarification.

Reports a clarification in the article by R. H. Moos et al (Psychology and Aging, 1990[Mar], Vol 5[1], 31–40). The authors wish to note that research reported in the article by P. L. Brennan and R. H. Moos (see record 1991-10154-001) was based on the sample used in the research reported by Moos et al and that this information was inadvertently deleted in the Brennan and Moos article. (The following abstract of the article by Moos et al originally appeared in PA, Vol 77:14961.) The Coping Responses Inventory (CRI) was used to study coping among older problem and nonproblem drinkers. The CRI organizes coping efforts according to their focus (approach or avoidance) and method (cognitive or behavioral). Compared with nonproblem drinkers, older problem drinkers were more likely to use cognitive and behavioral avoidance responses to manage life stressors. Problem drinkers who experienced more negative life events and more severe stressors used both more approach and more avoidance coping. Those who had more financial and social resources relied more on approach and less on avoidance coping. Problem drinkers who relied more on avoidance coping tended to have more drinking problems and to report more depression and physical symptoms and less self-confidence. Positive reappraisal was associated with less depression and more self-confidence. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Life stressors, social resources, and late-life problem drinking.

Life stressors and social resources among late-middle-aged problem and nonproblem drinkers were studied. Problem drinkers (n?=?501) reported more negative life events, chronic stressors, and social resource deficits than did nonproblem drinkers (n?=?609). In a comparison of problem drinkers, men reported more ongoing stressors involving finances and friends and reported fewer resources from children, extended-family members, and friends than did women. Women who are problem drinkers reported more negative life events, more ongoing difficulties with spouses and extended-family members, and fewer resources from spouses. Among both the problem and nonproblem drinkers, more stressors were associated with fewer social resources, but only within certain life domains. Late-middle-aged adults' chronic stressors and social resources helped explain their drinking behavior, depression, and self-confidence even after sex, marital status, and negative life events were considered. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Predicting the development of late-life late-onset drinking problems: a 7-year prospective study

There has been little empirical study of risk factors for the development of late-life late-onset drinking problems. In the current prospective study, we compare two groups of older adults who, at a baseline assessment, were nonproblem drinkers: individuals who developed drinking problems over the course of the next 7 years (n = 77) and those who did not (n = 197). Late-onset problem drinkers reported mild to moderate drinking problems and spontaneous remission rates were high. Compared with stable nonproblem drinkers, late-onset problem drinkers at baseline were more likely to report incipient problems, heavier alcohol consumption, greater friend approval of drinking, more reliance on avoidance coping strategies, were more likely to smoke, and were less likely to have acute medical conditions that could potentially be complicated by alcohol consumption. Contrary to expectation, life stressors did not predict drinking problem onset. However, compared with stable nonproblem drinkers, late-onset problem drinkers were more likely to have a history of responding to stressors and negative affect with increased alcohol consumption.     

"Life stressors, social resources, and late-life problem drinking": Clarification.

Reports a clarification in the article by P. L. Brennan and R. H. Moos (Psychology and Aging, 1990[Dec], Vol 5[4], 491–501). The authors wish to note that their study was based on the same sample that was used in the research reported in the article by R. H. Moos et al (see record 1990-14961-001) and that this information was inadvertently deleted in the Brennan and Moos article. (The following abstract of the article by Brennan and Moos originally appeared in PA, Vol 78:10154.) Life stressors and social resources among late-middle-aged problem and nonproblem drinkers were studied. Problem drinkers (n?=?501) reported more negative life events, chronic stressors, and social resource deficits than did nonproblem drinkers (n?=?609). In a comparison of problem drinkers, men reported more ongoing stressors involving finances and friends and reported fewer resources from children, extended-family members, and friends than did women. Women who are problem drinkers reported more negative life events, more ongoing difficulties with spouses and extended-family members, and fewer resources from spouses. Among both the problem and nonproblem drinkers, more stressors were associated with fewer social resources, but only within certain life domains. Late-middle-aged adults' chronic stressors and social resources helped explain their drinking behavior, depression, and self-confidence even after sex, marital status, and negative life events were considered. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Spouses of late-life problem drinkers: Functioning, coping responses, and family contexts.

This prospective study focused on spouses of late-life problem drinkers. At initial assessment, 87 spouses of late-life problem drinkers reported poorer health-related and social functioning, more reliance on cognitive coping strategies, and more shared, cognitive avoidance coping than did 87 spouses of nonproblem drinkers; they also reported more stressful, less supportive family contexts. 22 spouses of individuals who would remit over a 1-yr interval did not appear to provide their partners with an impetus for recovery. However, spouses of remitted problem drinkers improved in several areas over the 1-yr follow-up. By contrast, 65 spouses of nonremitted partners continued to function more poorly and reported less supportive relationships with partners and escalating conflicts with children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Life circumstances and personal resources as predictors of the ten-year course of depression

A 10-year naturalistic study of 313 patients who entered treatment for unipolar depression and a community comparison group of 284 nondepressed adults was conducted. We compared life stressors, social resources, personal resources, and coping among patients who were remitted (N = 76), partially remitted (N = 146), or nonremitted (N = 91). Compared with the controls and the remitted patients, the partially remitted and nonremitted patients consistently experienced more life stressors and fewer social resources, were less easygoing, and relied more on avoidance coping. A less easygoing disposition, fewer close relationships, and more reliance on avoidance coping were associated with higher odds of experiencing a course of partial remission or nonremission. In addition, more depressive symptoms and medical conditions predicted nonremission.     

Cognitive coping, affective distress, and maternal sensitivity: Mothers of children with Down syndrome.

This study investigated relations among maternal cognitive coping style (approach-avoidance), affective state, and sensitivity. Fifty-six mothers and their children with Down syndrome were followed for 2 years. Cognitive coping and affective distress inventories were administered and sensitivity was rated on the basis of mother-child observations. Results indicated that approach and avoidance have been widely studied under different designations and are stable across time. These cognitive coping variables may mediate the stress of parenting a child with a disability in complex ways. Mothers with a strong tendency to monitor stressors report greater affective distress than do mothers who adopt a less vigilant coping style. At the same time, cognitive avoidance of stressors and affective distress reduce the behavioral sensitivity of the mother toward her child. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personal and contextual determinants of coping strategies.

This study examined personal and contextual predictors of active and avoidance coping strategies in a community sample of over 400 adults and in a sample of over 400 persons entering psychiatric treatment for unipolar depression. Sociodemographic factors of education and income (except for active-cognitive coping), personality dispositions of self-confidence and an easy-going manner, and contextual factors of negative life events and family support each made a significant incremental contribution to predicting active and avoidance coping. Among both healthy adults and patients, active and avoidance coping were positively associated with negative life events. Individuals who had more personal and environmental resources were more likely to rely on active coping and less likely to use avoidance coping. Moreover, for both groups, most of the predictors continued to show significant relations with active and avoidance coping strategies even after the stable component in coping was controlled in a longitudinal design. A comprehensive framework to understand the determinants of coping can be of practical value in suggesting points for therapeutic interventions aimed at fostering more adaptive coping efforts. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reinforcement analysis of interaction in problem and nonproblem families.

Examined the patterns of consequents that problem and nonproblem family members provided for each other's behavior, and the responsivity of the members to those consequents. 20 families with a male child 5–10 yrs old were selected on the basis of their Locke-Wallace Marital Adjustment Scale and Peterson-Quay Behavior Problem Checklist scores. The families' interactions were observed in a laboratory setting and coded using a behavioral rating system. Results show that problem families provided more aversive and fewer positive consequents for prosocial behavior and more positive and fewer consequents for deviant behavior than nonproblem families. Problem family members were less responsive to the consequents than nonproblem family members. Results are discussed in terms of the development and maintenance of dysfunctional family systems. (24 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Collaborative coping and daily mood in couples dealing with prostate cancer.

Collaborative coping (i.e., spouses pooling resources and problem solving jointly) may be associated with better daily mood because of heightened perceptions of efficacy in coping with stressful events. The study examined the daily processes of collaborative coping (individuals' perceptions that the spouse collaborated), perceived coping effectiveness (ratings of how well they dealt with the event), and mood (i.e., Positive and Negative Affect Scale) across 14 days in 57 older couples coping with stressors involving the husband's prostate cancer and daily life in general. In hierarchical multivariate linear models, collaborative coping was associated with more positive same-day mood for both husbands and wives and less negative mood for wives only. These associations were partially mediated by heightened perceptions of coping effectiveness. Exploratory analyses revealed that collaborative coping was more frequent among wives who performed more poorly on cognitive tests and couples who reported greater marital satisfaction and more frequently using collaboration to make decisions. The results suggest that older couples may benefit from collaborative coping in dealing with problems surrounding illness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Coping, expectancies, and alcohol abuse: A test of social learning formulations.

The model proposed here postulates that alcohol abuse can be predicted from a causal chain that includes alcohol consumption and "drinking to cope" as proximal determinants and general coping skills and positive alcohol expectancies as more distal determinants. To evaluate this model in a way that permits simultaneous consideration of its multiple determinants and control for demographic influences, path analytic techniques were applied to data from problem and nonproblem drinkers drawn from a general population sample. The hypothesized model accounted for significant variance in abuse status. Drinking to cope emerged as the most powerful predictor, exerting influence via direct and indirect pathways. Coping styles indicative of avoidance of emotion emerged as more important predictors of abuse than problem-focused coping. The predictive value of coping was moderated by alcohol expectancies such that avoidant styles of coping with emotion were predictive of abuse status only among drinkers expressing greater belief in alcohol's positive reinforcing properties. Findings both support and refine the social learning perspective on alcohol abuse. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Influence of dispositional coping strategies on physical complaints and life satisfaction in the elderly

Well-being and mental and physical health in old age are influenced in a significant way by the fact that it is possible to cope successfully with ongoing hazards, threats and problems. In recent years coping research has shown increasing interest in coping processes in the elderly. Most of the studies are focused on age-related differences in coping processes and on the issue of change or stability of coping in old age. However, the goal of our study was to examine the impact of dispositional coping strategies, conceptualized as consistent personality characteristics, on physical complaints and life satisfaction among the elderly. We recurred on the model of coping modes by Krohne, which postulates two statistically independent person-specific coping dimensions named "vigilance" and "cognitive avoidance". Based on this model it is possible to identify the "classical" coping styles of "sensitization" (high vigilance and low cognitive avoidance) and "repression" (low vigilance and high cognitive avoidance). In our study, including 766 subjects older than 60 years, we found a higher frequency of "repressors" than of "sensitizers". Results show that dispositional coping strategies are significant moderator variables of both physical complaints and life satisfaction: Older people who prefer a cognitive-avoidant coping strategy ("repressors") are more satisfied with their life and have less complaints than "sensitizers".     

Stress Generation, Avoidance Coping, and Depressive Symptoms: A 10-Year Model.

This study examined (a) the role of avoidance coping in prospectively generating both chronic and acute life stressors and (b) the stress-generating role of avoidance coping as a prospective link to future depressive symptoms. Participants were 1,211 late-middle-aged individuals (500 women and 711 men) assessed 3 times over a 10-year period. As predicted, baseline avoidance coping was prospectively associated with both more chronic and more acute life stressors 4 years later. Furthermore, as predicted, these intervening life stressors linked baseline avoidance coping and depressive symptoms 10 years later, controlling for the influence of initial depressive symptoms. These findings broaden knowledge about the stress-generation process and elucidate a key mechanism through which avoidance coping is linked to depressive symptoms. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Changes in alcoholic patients' coping responses predict 12-month treatment outcomes.

Patient subtypes (Types A and B alcoholism), determinants, and outcomes associated with changes in coping responses of 133 alcoholic patients in the year following admission to treatment were examined. In general, patients' use of avoidance coping declined and use of approach coping increased. Type B patients used more avoidance coping than did Type A patients, but the subtypes did not differ in rate of change in coping. As a determinant of coping, cognitive appraisal of threat showed a trend toward predicting avoidance coping at 6- and 12-month follow-ups. Decreased cognitive avoidance coping (e.g., daydreaming) predicted fewer alcohol, psychological, and interpersonal problems. Increased behavioral approach coping (e.g., taking action) predicted lower severity of alcohol problems. Further study of changes in the cognitive aspects of coping (i.e., appraisals and cognitive avoidance coping) is needed to determine mechanisms underlying cognitive processes associated with treatment outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stress and alcohol use: Moderating effects of gender, coping, and alcohol expectancies.

A stressor vulnerability model of stress-induced drinking was tested in a stratified random sample of 1,316 Black and White adult drinkers. Stressors were highly predictive of both alcohol use and drinking problems among men who relied on avoidant forms of emotion coping or held strong positive expectancies for alcohol's effects and accounted for more than 35% of the variance in alcohol use among the subgroup of men who were high in both vulnerability factors. In contrast, stressors were negatively related among men who were low in both and were unrelated among women regardless of their coping or expectancies. These findings suggest that tension reduction theories of alcohol use are overly broad and that individual characteristics must be considered to account for stress-related effects on alcohol use and abuse. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Coping and Anxiety in Women Recalled for Additional Diagnostic Procedures Following an Abnormal Screening Mammogram.

This study characterized women's concurrent and subsequent levels of emotional distress associated with a questionable mammogram screening and relationships between women's coping and psychosocial adjustment. State anxiety was assessed in 98 women 1 day after receiving a mammogram screening (Time 1), after notification of a questionable screening result that necessitated additional testing (Time 2), and after being informed of their breast-cancer-free status (Time 3). Key findings include (a) women reported a significant increase in anxiety following notification of the need to return for follow-up testing; (b) significant and positive associations were found between anxiety and behavioral approach, behavioral avoidance, cognitive approach, and cognitive avoidance coping in cross-sectional analyses; and (c) cognitive avoidance coping was a strong predictor of final levels of state anxiety in women. Findings suggest that cognitive avoidance coping plays an important role in reducing anxiety in women recalled to clarify an initially ambiguous screening procedure. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Long-term patterns and predictors of successful stressor resolution in later life.

At 1 year, 4 years, and 10 years after baseline, late-middle-aged adults reported whether they had successfully resolved their most important stressor of the past year. Compared to individuals who never resolved focal stressors over the 10-year interval, those who always did consistently showed less negative stressor appraisal, less reliance on avoidance coping, and less use of exploratory relative to directed coping responses, independent of type and severity of focal stressor. Less use of exploratory relative to directed coping and having more social resources, fewer health problems, and fewer depressive symptoms at baseline predicted more stressor resolution over the next 10 years. These predictors are promising foci for prospective efforts to optimize ways in which aging adults manage late-life stressors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personality, coping, and family resources in stress resistance: A longitudinal analysis.

A longitudinal analysis was conducted in which stress-resistance factors in the areas of personality, coping, and family support assessed at an initial testing were used to predict psychological and physical adjustment 1 yr later, controlling for initial adjustment. 245 men (mean age 46.8 yrs) and 248 women (mean age 44 yrs) in randomly selected families in the San Francisco Bay area were surveyed on psychosomatic symptoms and depression, negative life changes, personality characteristics, avoidance coping, and family support. Findings show that feelings of self-confidence, an easy-going disposition, a disinclination to use avoidance coping, and the availability of family support operated jointly to protect Ss from negative psychological consequences of life stress. For women, stress resistance was related to emotional and physical distress; for men, resistance was associated with emotional distress. Negative life changes predicted depression and psychosomatic complaints in both sexes even when initial distress was considered. Results support previous research on the causal role of stress resistance in emotional and physical health. (38 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Nonproblem drinking outcomes in adolescents treated for alcohol use disorders.

Change to nonproblem drinking was studied in 159 adolescents (70% male) presenting for alcohol use disorders (AUDs) treatment. A community sample (n=148, 47% male) also was assessed. Clinical participants had a current AUD at baseline; 1 year later, 17% remained abstinent, 60% had at least 1 AUD symptom (problem drinkers), and 23% were drinking but had no AUD symptoms (nonproblem drinkers). Drinking among the nonproblem drinkers decreased and was lower than in the problem drinkers. Nonproblem drinkers increased in psychosocial functioning and decreased in the number of illicit drugs used relative to problem drinkers and generally did not differ from the abstainers. The results suggest alternative views of treatment goals, relapse, and treatment outcome in adolescents. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Risk factors at intake predict nonremission among depressed patients.

Risk factors assessed at intake for the treatment of unipolar depression were used to predict remission, partial remission, or nonremission 1 year later. The factors included demographic variables, treatment history and severity of symptoms, stressors (medical conditions), personal deficits (avoidance coping), and social support deficits (quality of an important relationship). Each factor considered alone was associated with later remission status such that the prototypical nonremitted patient was a man at least 40 years old who had had prior treatment, an intense depression, and one or more serious medical conditions. In addition, he used avoidance coping strategies to deal with stressors, and his important relationship was not of good quality. When the risk factors were considered together, an increasing number of factors was associated with an increasing likelihood of nonremission. Separate analyses for inpatients and outpatients revealed similar patterns. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)