Dyadic coping in metastatic breast cancer.

Objective: Couples facing metastatic breast cancer (MBC) must learn to cope with stressors that can affect both partners’ quality of life as well as the quality of their relationship. Common dyadic coping involves taking a “we” approach, whereby partners work together to maintain their relationship while jointly managing their shared stress. This study prospectively evaluated whether common dyadic coping was associated with less cancer-related distress and greater dyadic adjustment for female MBC patients and their male partners. Design: Couples (N = 191) completed surveys at the start of treatment for MBC (baseline), and 3 and 6 months later. Main Outcome Measures: Cancer-related distress was assessed with the Impact of Events Scale; dyadic adjustment was assessed using the short-form of the Dyadic Adjustment Scale. Results: Multilevel models using the couple as the unit of analysis showed that the effects of common positive dyadic coping on cancer-related distress significantly differed for patients and their partners. Whereas partners experienced slightly lower levels of distress, patients experienced slightly higher levels of distress. Although patients and partners who used more common negative dyadic coping experienced significantly greater distress at all times, the association was stronger for patients. Finally, using more common positive dyadic coping and less common negative dyadic coping was mutually beneficial for patients and partners in terms of greater dyadic adjustment. Conclusion: Our findings underscore the importance of couples working together to manage the stress associated with MBC. Future research may benefit from greater focus on the interactions between patients and their partners to address ways that couples can adaptively cope together. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fathers' cognitive appraisals, coping strategies, and support resources as correlates of adjustment to parenthood.

Adjustment to parenthood was explored among fathers by applying R. S. Lazarus's (1993) theoretical model of stress and coping. Within a longitudinal framework, the assessment of 90 primiparous fathers and 90 primiparous mothers included measures of cognitive appraisals of parenting, coping strategies used to deal with parenting issues, and support resources at 1 month postpartum. Adjustment to parenthood in terms of well-being and involvement with the infant was assessed at 12 months postpartum by means of measures of parental burnout as well as observed caregiving and affiliative behaviors. Patterns of appraisals, coping strategies, and support resources related to parenting were both found to differ substantially between fathers and mothers and to be differentially associated with adjustment to parenthood. The results are discussed in light of the socialization theory and the role constraint theory explaining gender differences in the coping processes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Appraisals and coping with workplace interpersonal stress: A model for women managers.

This study extended a previously developed integrative model of workplace stress by focusing specifically on interpersonal stressors. After controlling for negative affect, results of the prospective study of 157 Canadian managerial women indicated that conflicts appraised as threats to self-interest, less perceived control over the stressor, and more upsetting appraisals led to the use of disengagement coping, whereas conflicts appraised as threats to social relationships and greater control were associated with the use of engagement coping. Individual differences were also associated with primary appraisals and perceptions of the work environment. Primary appraisals had both direct and indirect effects on psychosomatic distress and fully mediated the effects of individual differences on distress. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Immigration as a multiple-stressor situation: Stress and coping among immigrants from the former Soviet Union in Israel.

The present study investigated the adaptation process of immigrants from the former Soviet Union in Israel as a multiple-stressor situation that involves cognitive appraisals and coping efforts. A sample of 301 new immigrants (residing in Israel three years or less), 67% women, 25 to 45 years old, completed inventories measuring cognitive appraisals of three major immigration stressors--employment, language, and housing difficulties--and the strategies used to cope with these demands. Level of distress (as indicated by depression and anxiety) was also assessed. The results show positive associations between cognitive appraisals of the various stressors, as well as between the coping strategies applied to them, indicating mutual influences between stressors in a multiple-stressor situation. In addition, an interaction between the appraisals of threat/loss of the three stressors predicted the respondents' distress level, supporting the potentiation model of coping with multiple stressors. Last, the findings support the notion of a stable coping style by showing especially high correlations between coping efforts with different stressors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Benefit finding, affective reactions to diabetes stress, and diabetes management among early adolescents.

Objective: To examine whether benefit finding was associated with better adjustment among adolescents with diabetes by buffering negative affective reactions to diabetes stress and by promoting positive affective reactions. Design: Early adolescents aged 10–14 with Type 1 diabetes (n = 252) described recent diabetes stressors, affective reactions, and perceived coping effectiveness. They also completed measures of benefit finding, depressive symptoms, and adherence. Metabolic control (i.e., HbA1c) was obtained from medical records. Main Outcome Measures: The main outcome measures were perceived coping effectiveness, depressive symptoms, adherence, and HbA1c. Results: Benefit finding was associated with lower depressive symptoms, higher perceived coping effectiveness and better adherence, and with higher positive as well as negative affective reactions to diabetes stress. Benefit finding interacted with negative affective reactions to predict depressive symptoms and HbA1c. Negative affective reactions to stress were associated with poorer adjustment among those with low benefit finding, but were unrelated or more weakly related to poor adjustment among those with high benefit finding. Positive affective reactions did not mediate associations between benefit finding and any outcome. Conclusions: Consistent with a stress-buffering process, benefit finding may be a resource that buffers the disruptive aspects of negative affective reactions to stress for adolescents' diabetes management. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of gender and negative affectivity in stressor appraisal and coping selection.

Individual differences in stress may arise from many sources. This study investigated the role of gender and negative affectivity (NA) in stressor appraisal and coping selection. Differential exposure to stressors was controlled by requiring participants to rate the stressfulness of identical hypothetical scenarios. As predicted, women rated the scenarios as more stressful than men, and perceptions of stressfulness increased with participant NA. Women endorsed the use of emotion-focused coping strategies more than men, even when perceived stressfulness was controlled. NA predicted use of both emotion- and avoidance-focused coping, although only the latter association remained significant after controlling for stressor appraisals. Gender × NA interaction effects were not significant. Implications for the prediction and management of stress are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of core self-evaluations in the coping process.

In 2 studies, the authors investigated whether core self-evaluations (CSE) serve as an integrative framework for understanding individual differences in coping processes. A meta-analytic review demonstrated that CSEs were associated with fewer perceived stressors, lower strain, less avoidance coping, more problem-solving coping, and were not strongly related to emotion-focused coping. Consistent with the meta-analytic results, a daily diary study demonstrated that individuals with high CSE perceived fewer stressors, experienced less strain after controlling for stressors, and engaged in less avoidance coping. However, both studies demonstrated that emotional stability was uniquely related to the stress and coping process and that emotional stability moderated the relationship between stressors and strain. The discussion focuses on the distinction between depressive self-concept represented by CSE and the anxiety and worry represented by emotional stability. (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)     

A developmental-contextual model of couples coping with chronic illness across the adult life span.

A developmental-contextual model of couples coping with chronic illness is presented that views chronic illness as affecting the adjustment of both the patient and the spouse such that coping strategies enacted by the patient are examined in relation to those enacted by the spouse, and vice versa. The developmental model emphasizes that dyadic coping may be different at various phases of the life span, changing temporally at different stages of dealing with the illness as well as unfolding daily as spouses interact around dyadic stressors. In addition, couples engaged in dyadic coping are affected by broad sociocultural factors (culture and gender) as well as more proximal contextual factors (quality of the marital relationship and the specific demands of the chronic illness). The model provides a framework for understanding how couples coping with chronic illness may together appraise and cope with illness during adulthood and for determining when spousal involvement is beneficial or harmful to both patient and spousal adjustment. The developmental-contextual model to dyadic appraisal and coping has numerous research implications for the field, and the authors conclude with specific recommendations for future research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The relationship between dyadic coping and marital quality: A 2-year longitudinal study.

Previous studies have revealed that the ways couples deal with stress in their lives are significantly associated with their marital quality and overall marital functioning. However, there has been little empirical evidence linking dyadic coping with marital quality over time. This study addresses the relationship between dyadic coping and marital quality among 90 couples over a period of 2 years. The results reveal that dyadic coping was significantly associated with marital quality over 2 years. For women, both their own dyadic coping and that of their partner were significant predictors, whereas for men only their own dyadic coping was predictive. The results are discussed with regard to prevention of marital distress. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personal resilience, cognitive appraisals, and coping: an integrative model of adjustment to abortion

We hypothesized that the effects of personality (self-esteem, control, and optimism) on postabortion adaptation (distress, well-being, and decision satisfaction) would be fully mediated by preabortion cognitive appraisals (stress appraisals and self-efficacy appraisals) and postabortion coping. We further proposed that the effects of preabortion appraisals on adaptation would be fully mediated by postabortion coping. Results of a longitudinal study of 527 women who had first-trimester abortions supported our hypotheses. Women with more resilient personalities appraised their abortion as less stressful and had higher self-efficacy for coping with the abortion. More positive appraisals predicted greater acceptance/reframing coping and lesser avoidance/denial, venting, support seeking, and religious coping. Acceptance-reframing predicted better adjustment on all measures, whereas avoidance-denial and venting related to poorer adjustment on all measures. Greater support seeking was associated with reduced distress, and greater religious coping was associated with less decision satisfaction.     

Parental depression and interparental conflict: Children and adolescents’ self-blame and coping responses.

The present study examined the role of children and adolescents’ perceptions of self-blame specific to interparental conflict and children and adolescents’ coping behaviors in the context of parental depression as predictors of internalizing and externalizing symptoms in a sample of 108 youth (age 9–15 years old) of parents with a history of depression. Higher levels of current depressive symptoms in parents were associated with higher levels of interparental conflict and higher levels of internalizing symptoms in children and adolescents, and interparental conflict was positively associated with both internalizing and externalizing symptoms in children/adolescents. Consistent across a series of multiple regression models, children and adolescents’ perceptions of self-blame and use of secondary control coping (acceptance, distraction, cognitive restructuring, positive thinking) were significant, independent predictors of both internalizing and externalizing symptoms. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Romantic partners' individual coping strategies and dyadic coping: Implications for relationship functioning.

Individual coping strategies and dyadic coping independently predict partner well-being and relationship functioning; however, it is unclear whether the coping processes are inter-related and whether they uniquely contribute to romantic relationship functioning. One hundred heterosexual dating couples rated the individual coping strategy of negative mood regulation as well as positive and negative dyadic coping. Relationship functioning was assessed via partners' reports of relationship satisfaction and observers' ratings of negative interaction in conflict. Actor-Partner Interdependence Models (APIMs; Cook & Kenny, 2005; Kashy & Kenny, 2000) revealed associations between individual coping and dyadic coping in the predicted directions. APIMs also indicated the unique contributions of positive and negative dyadic coping to relationship functioning, above and beyond contributions of individual coping strategies. Implications of dyadic coping as a target of efforts to prevent or treat partner and/or relational distress are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive appraisals, coping strategies, and support resources as correlates of parenting and infant development

By applying R. S. Lazarus's (1993) theoretical model, the authors explored the dynamics of stress and coping as central mechanisms underlying parenting adjustment and infant development. Longitudinal assessment of 140 primiparous mothers included measures of cognitive appraisals of parenting, coping strategies used, and supportive coping resources at pregnancy and 1 month, 6 months, and 12 months postpartum. Maternal outcome measures of adjustment included maternal well-being, parental efficacy, and observed behaviors of caregiving and affiliation. Infant developmental outcome was measured by the Bayley Scales of Infant Development (N. Bayley, 1993). All measures of the stress and coping model showed systematic developmental changes across the transition to parenthood as well as relative stability of individual differences. In addition, the stress and coping variables were found to have additive and interactive effects in predicting both maternal adjustment and infant development.     

Predicting longitudinal changes in caregiver physical and mental health: A stress process model.

Alzheimer's family caregivers (N?=?122) reported on physical and mental health, as well as stress process variables, at baseline and at a 1-year follow-up. Hierarchical regression analyses of stress process models revealed that increases in primary stressors (e.g., patient self-care and behavioral problems) did not directly affect changes in the mental and physical health outcome variables. However, analyses of models of direct, mediated, and moderated effects revealed that psychosocial resource variables (appraisals, coping responses, and social support) were related to caregiver outcomes over time through several mechanisms. In particular, benign appraisals of stressors, the use of approach coping, and greater levels of social support were associated with more positive caregiver health outcomes over time. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Patterns and profiles of response to incivility in the workplace.

The authors draw on stress and coping theory to understand patterns of individual response to workplace incivility. According to data from 3 employee samples, incivility tended to trigger mildly negative appraisals, which could theoretically differentiate incivility from other categories of antisocial work behavior. Employees experiencing frequent and varied incivility from powerful instigators generally appraised their uncivil encounters more negatively. They responded to this stressor using a multifaceted array of coping strategies, which entailed support seeking, detachment, minimization, prosocial conflict avoidance, and assertive conflict avoidance. These coping reactions depended on the target’s appraisal of the situation, the situation’s duration, and the organizational position and power of both target and instigator. Implications for organizational science and practice are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mother and father connectedness and involvement during early adolescence.

The purpose of the current study was to explore how mother’s and father’s connectedness and involvement individually and collectively influence the lives of their children. Specifically, we asked how fathers’ and mothers’ parent–child connectedness and behavioral involvement influenced both problem behaviors (externalizing and internalizing behaviors) and positive outcomes (prosocial behaviors and hope) during early adolescence. Data for this study were taken from the Flourishing Families Project, from which 349 mothers and fathers were selected, along with their early adolescent child (mean age = 11.23 years, SD = .96). Hierarchical regression analyses revealed (even after controlling for child age, gender, and self-regulation) that mothers’ and fathers’ contributions differed, primarily as a function of child outcome. Namely, father (but not mother) connectedness and involvement were negatively related to adolescents’ internalizing and externalizing behaviors, whereas mother (but not father) connectedness and involvement were positively related to adolescents’ prosocial behaviors and hope. We also found that when one parent’s involvement was low (for whatever reason), the other parent’s involvement made a significant and important contribution to the child’s well-being, particularly in the area of internalizing behaviors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

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)     

Relations between appraisals and coping schemas: Support for the congruence model.

Determined whether relations between appraisal and 5 coping schemata were consistent with predictions from the congruence model (CM) of effective coping. Participants were 185 undergraduates in search of employment. Multiple regression analyses revealed that appraisals of challenge and controllability significantly predicted strategies representative of the problem-focused schema, whereas threat appraisals significantly predicted emotion-focused coping. The existential coping schema was positively associated with appraisals of challenge and low threat. Spiritual coping was also significantly predicted by appraised uncontrollability. Results extend evidence of appraisal-coping relations to a broader range of coping strategies and demonstrate the heuristic value of the cognitive schema approach to coping and of the CM in predicting appraisal–coping relations. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stress, appraisal, coping, and social support as predictors of adaptational outcome among dementia caregivers.

A stress and coping model was used to study predictors of individual differences in caregiver adaptation. A total of 54 family caregivers of elderly dementia patients completed interviews and questionnaires assessing the severity of patient impairment and caregiving stressors; caregiver appraisals, coping responses, and social support and activity; and caregiver outcomes, including depression, life satisfaction, and self-rated health. Correlational and regression analyses supported the utility of the stress and coping model. Appraisal, coping responses, and social support and activity were significant predictors of caregiver outcome, even when severity of caregiving stressors was statistically controlled. The importance of a multidimensional approach to assessing caregiver outcomes was supported by regression analyses indicating that each caregiver outcome was predicted by different patterns of stressors, appraisal, coping, and social support and activity. Results are discussed in terms of a stress and coping model of caregiving, and clinical implications for work with caregiving families. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)