Goal adjustment capacities, coping, and subjective well-being: The sample case of caregiving for a family member with mental illness.

This study examined the associations between goal adjustment capacities, coping, and indicators of subjective well-being in 2 waves of data from individuals who provide care for a family member with mental illness. We hypothesized that goal adjustment capacities would predict higher levels of subjective well-being by facilitating coping with caregiving stress. Results showed that goal disengagement was associated with effective care-specific coping (e.g., less self-blame and substance use). Goal reengagement was also associated with effective care-specific coping (e.g., positive reframing), but at the same time it predicted the use of less effective strategies (e.g., venting and self-distraction). Moreover, goal disengagement predicted lower levels of caregiver burden and depressive symptoms and buffered the longitudinal effect of caregiver burden on increases in depressive symptoms. Goal reengagement, by contrast, predicted higher levels of caregiver burden and purpose in life and buffered the cross-sectional association between caregiver burden and depressive symptoms. Finally, effective (and less useful) care-specific coping statistically explained the adaptive (and maladaptive) effects of goal adjustment capacities on participants' well-being. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

A test of the effects of pregnenolone methyl ether on subjective feelings of B-29 crews after a twelve-hour mission.

Members of 7 B-29 crews received PME (experimental = 51) or a placebo (controls = 49) and took a group of psychological tests measuring manifest irritability, anxiety, and fatigue reactions, after a long (15-18 hours) over-water training mission. The tests were administered both before the drug administration (immediately upon landing) and after unloading the planes (which followed drug administration). Although there were significant pre-test and post-test differences for each group, there were no significant inter-group differences. "This study does not support the use of PME for the alleviation of depression, irritability and anxiety feelings of crew members." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Needs and subjective well-being around the world.

Across a sample of 123 countries, we examined the association between the fulfillment of needs and subjective well-being (SWB), including life evaluation, positive feelings, and negative feelings. Need fulfillment was consistently associated with SWB across world regions. Life evaluation was most associated with fulfilling basic needs; positive feelings were most associated with social and respect needs; and negative feelings were most associated with basic, respect, and autonomy needs. Societal need fulfillment predicted SWB, particularly for life evaluation, beyond individuals' fulfillment of their own needs, indicating the desirability of living in a flourishing society. In addition, the associations of SWB with the fulfillment of specific needs were largely independent of whether other needs were fulfilled. These trends persisted when household income was taken into account. The emergent ordering of need fulfillment for psychosocial needs were fairly consistent across country conditions, but the fulfillment of basic and safety needs were contingent on country membership. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Psychological adjustment and the worker role: An analysis of occupational differences.

How does the place of worker role on his personal adjustment vary from nonmanual to manual type of employment? "301 Ss, all between the ages of 55 and 65, were divided into two occupational statuses, nonmanual and manual workers. The former status included 116 of the managerial, supervisory, professional-technical, and clerical-sales personnel of a Midwestern oil refinery, while the latter status contained 185 of that company's skilled, semiskilled, and unskilled laborers. Both groups were then treated as separate populations in an analysis of the worker role as it related to personal adjustment, social adjustment, and job satisfaction… . the personal adjustment of nonmanual employees was not significantly related with their work-role competency, while the personal adjustment of manual employees showed a significant correlation with the worker role variable… . It was therefore concluded that the degree to which personal adjustment is related with the worker role depends to some extent upon an employee's occupational status." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Relations of SARS-related stressors and coping to Chinese college students' psychological adjustment during the 2003 Beijing SARS epidemic.

This study examined the main and interactive relations of stressors and coping related to severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) with Chinese college students' psychological adjustment (psychological symptoms, perceived general health, and life satisfaction) during the 2003 Beijing SARS epidemic. All the constructs were assessed by self-report in an anonymous survey during the final period of the outbreak. Results showed that the relations of stressors and coping to psychological adjustment varied by domain of adjustment. Regression analyses suggested that the number of stressors and use of avoidant coping strategies positively predicted psychological symptoms. Active coping positively predicted life satisfaction when controlling for stressors. Moreover, all types of coping served as a buffer against the negative impact of stressors on perceived general health. These findings hold implications for university counseling services during times of acute, large-scale stressors. In particular, effective screening procedures should be developed to identify students who experience a large number of stressors and thus are at high risk for developing mental health problems. Intervention efforts that target coping should be adapted to take account of the uncontrollability of stressors and clients' cultural preferences for certain coping strategies. A multidimensional battery of psychological adjustment should be used to monitor clients' psychological adjustment to stressors and evaluate the efficacy of intervention. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dimensions of subjective female orgasmic responsiveness.

Results of psychological research show that although female orgasm appears to be a single process physiologically, subjective reports by women indicate that individual differences in their experience are multidimensional. The basis for the discrepant findings was analyzed in 2 studies of reported orgasmic experiences in women. One sample of 115 sexually experienced women (aged 18–52 yrs) yielded data that replicated the finding that coital and masturbatory orgasmic responsiveness can be statistically distinguished and independently assessed, thus indicating that sample selection associated with prior research could not explain the result. A separate sample of 101 sexually experienced women (aged 18–58 yrs) were given an instrument that assessed coital responsiveness but differentiated masturbatory responsiveness into dimensions associated with masturbation when alone and with a partner without intercourse. A confirmatory factor analysis substantiated the existence of the 3 dimensions of female orgasm. However, female orgasmic responsiveness was highly correlated across the 3 dimensions so that it was possible to isolate a large 2nd-order factor of general orgasmic responsiveness that is consistent with most of the physiological evidence on the unitary nature of orgasm. (16 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Parenting and other influences on the alcohol use and emotional adjustment of children, adolescents, and emerging adults.

Five articles in a special section of Psychology of Addictive Behaviors (see records 2006-07521-001, 2006-07521-002, 2006-07521-003, 2006-07521-004, and 2006-07521-005) are briefly reviewed. With samples spanning an age range of 6 years to college age, the 5 articles examine potential mediators and moderators of psychological adjustment and drinking behavior. These articles illustrate the potential contributions of gender, personality traits, motivational factors, environmental characteristics, and parenting styles on the alcohol use, consequences, and emotional adjustment of children, adolescents, and emerging adults. Strengths and limitations of the different designs and methods are discussed in relation to the specific findings and the potential insights the special section provides. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

An examination of happiness as a buffer of the rumination–adjustment link: Ethnic differences between European and Asian American students.

Individuals who ruminate (i.e., a tendency to respond to negative life events with negative self-reflection) have consistently been found to be associated with maladaptive functioning (i.e., anxious and depressive symptoms). Happy individuals, on the other hand, have been found to have minimized anxious and depressive symptoms. Not surprisingly, rumination is negatively correlated with happiness. However, ethnic variations in the associations between these variables have not been studied previously. Thus, an integrative model involving rumination and happiness as predictors of psychological maladjustment (viz., depressive and anxious symptoms) was proposed and tested in 184 Asian Americans and 238 European Americans. For European Americans and not Asian Americans, results of hierarchical regression analysis indicated a significant Rumination × Happiness interaction in predicting each of the maladjustment measures after accounting for the influences of both rumination and happiness. These findings are taken to offer support for a more interactive regression model of psychological maladjustment involving rumination and happiness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional, cognitive, and family systems mediators of children's adjustment to interparental conflict.

Emotional, cognitive, and family systems processes have been identified as mediators of the association between interparental conflict and children's adjustment. However, little is known about how they function in relation to one another because they have not all been assessed in the same study. This investigation examined the relations among children's exposure to parental conflict, their appraisals of threat and blame, their emotional reaction, and triangulation into parental disagreements. One hundred fifty ethnically diverse 8- to 12-year-old children and both of their parents participated in the study. Comparisons of 3 models proposing different relations among these processes indicated that they function as parallel and independent mediators of children's adjustment. Specifically, children's self-blaming attributions and emotional distress were uniquely associated with both internalizing and externalizing problems, whereas perceived threat uniquely predicted internalizing problems and triangulation uniquely predicted externalizing problems. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effect of couple illness perception congruence on psychological adjustment in women with rheumatoid arthritis.

Objective: To characterize similarities and differences in illness perceptions between women with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and their husbands, and examine whether illness perception congruence predicted wives' subsequent psychological adjustment. Design: Women with RA and their husbands (N = 190 couples) recruited from community and clinical settings completed mailed surveys at baseline and 4-month follow-up. Main Outcome Measures: Data for this investigation included illness perceptions in partners and illness severity, marital variables, and psychological adjustment in wives. Results: In general, wives and husbands had similar views of RA. Couple congruence concerning women's personal control over RA and its cyclic nature predicted better psychological adjustment in women 4 months later. Post hoc tests showed better psychological adjustment in wives from couples with similar optimistic beliefs about personal control, illness coherence, and RA consequences, when compared to those in couples with similar pessimistic beliefs. Furthermore, when partners disagreed about RA's consequences, wives fared better when husbands overestimated rather than underestimated their beliefs. In contrast, couple congruence about the emotions and timeline of RA was unrelated to adjustment. Conclusion: It may be important for husbands to understand wives' views on their control over RA and its cyclic nature. Furthermore, wives may benefit when they share optimistic views with their husbands about RA, and when their husbands avoid underestimating RA's consequences. Developing interventions to enhance partners' illness understanding may be beneficial. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of perceived vulnerability in adjustment to lower extremity amputation: A preliminary investigation.

Objective: To examine the role of feelings of vulnerability in postamputation adjustment problems such as depression and diminished quality of life. Participants: Eighty-four patients with a lower extremity amputation. Setting: Five affiliated prosthetic clinics in Chicago. Main Measures: The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D), a 3-item quality-of-life measure, and a 2-item vulnerability measure. Participants' prosthetists completed a single-item rating of perceived adjustment. Results: Vulnerability accounted for significant portions of the variance in CES-D scores, quality-of-life ratings, and prosthetists' adjustment ratings. Conclusion: Feelings of vulnerability significantly affect adjustment in persons with amputations, and this impact is not limited to a single domain. Clinicians should assess feelings of vulnerability, the degree to which such feelings are realistic, and any past experiences with victimization. These issues need to be addressed with both individual counseling and community interventions aimed at reducing victimization of individuals with disabilities. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reflections on the Ethical Dimensions of Outcomes Research.

This article offers some observations about certain ethical dimensions of outcomes studies. After showing that the very possibility of conducting outcomes studies depends on a particular kind of metaphysical understanding of healing that not all cultures share, the article explores ethical issues raised by studies that examine prognostic tests, population characteristics, functional measures, the functional course of disability, and interventions that seek to prevent or to delay disability onset. The article concludes with some speculations on how current insurance trends that shift purchasing responsibility for health care from employers to employees might stimulate even more interest in outcomes research as well as raise additional ethical issues. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Latino sibling knowledge and adjustment to chronic disability.

Forty matched healthy Latino and non-Latino siblings (ages 8-14 years) of children with developmental and physical disabilities completed interviews and questionnaires assessing sibling knowledge of and adjustment to disability and sibling global psychological functioning. One-way analyses of variance revealed Latino siblings to have significantly less accurate information about the disability and more internalizing problems than non-Latino siblings. Sibling and parent wishes for the healthy sibling reflected cultural values. The results indicate that Latino siblings of children with chronic disabilities may be at risk for internalizing psychological problems. Future research regarding cultural factors affecting sibling adaptation to childhood disability is encouraged. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acculturation and adjustment among immigrant Chinese parents: Mediating role of parenting efficacy.

This study examined parenting efficacy beliefs as a mediator of the association between acculturation and adjustment. The sample consisted of 177 immigrant Chinese mothers and fathers with early adolescent children in Canada. Acculturation was assessed bidimensionally as Canadian and Chinese orientations. A latent psychological adjustment variable was composed of symptoms of depression, feelings of self-esteem, and life satisfaction. Results showed that relations between Canadian orientation and psychological adjustment were partially mediated by parenting efficacy. As expected, the more parents were oriented toward Canadian culture, the more efficacious they felt in their parenting, which in turn was associated with better psychological adjustment. In contrast, mediation of relations between Chinese orientation and psychological adjustment was not supported, as Chinese orientation was not associated with parenting efficacy and was positively associated with psychological adjustment for mothers only. Similar results were found when the meditational model was extended to evaluate parenting practices as an outcome (i.e., warmth, reasoning, and monitoring). That is, parenting efficacy mediated the relation between higher Canadian orientation and more positive parenting practices, whereas Chinese orientation was unrelated to parenting practices. Invariance testing suggested that the models were similar for mothers and fathers. Results support the theory that higher orientation to Canadian culture may advance feelings of parenting efficacy because parents have the cultural knowledge and skills to feel confident parenting in a new intercultural context. Further, they support the expectation that parenting efficacy beliefs, in turn, are important determinants of psychological adjustment and effective parenting for immigrant parents. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of self-blame and responsibility in adjustment to inflammatory bowel disease.

Objective: S. C. Roesch and B. Weiner's (2001) theoretical model of adjustment to chronic illness was adapted to examine the role of attributions, avoidant coping strategies, and disease severity in the psychological adjustment of people with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Research Method and Design: People with IBD (N = 259) completed an online survey including measures of health-related self-blame and responsibility attributions, disease severity, avoidant coping strategies, and psychological adjustment indexes (coping efficacy, acceptance, and helplessness). Results: Structural equation modeling revealed that avoidant coping mediated the relationship between attributions and psychological adjustment. Attributions of self-blame were directly related to increased avoidant coping, which was in turn associated with poor adjustment. Beliefs about responsibility were associated with decreased use of avoidant coping strategies and subsequently improved psychological adjustment. Higher scores on disease severity were linked to the use of avoidant coping strategies and poor psychological adjustment. Conclusions: Distinguishing between self-blame and responsibility attributions has important implications for understanding the psychological adjustment of individuals with IBD and may be useful for creating intervention strategies aimed at enhancing the psychological functioning of people with IBD. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Parenting and psychological adjustment of adolescent immigrants in Israel.

Parental and familial factors and their association with adolescents’ mental health were examined among former Soviet Union (FSU) immigrants and nonimmigrants in Israel. Questionnaires regarding parental control, inconsistency, and rejection, in addition to adolescent–family connectedness and psychological disorders, were administered to 83 FSU immigrants and 106 nonimmigrant adolescents. According to the results, FSU adolescents are less connected to their families, experience their parents as less warm and more inconsistent in their childrearing behavior, report that their mothers subject them to a higher level of control, and the psychological disorders among them are more widespread than among nonimmigrant adolescents. Maternal control, maternal temporal inconsistency, and maternal and paternal rejection were associated with psychological disorders only among nonimmigrant adolescents. No such association was found among FSU adolescents, suggesting that FSU mental health problems are associated with immigration and cultural and social factors, rather than parental and familial factors. A comprehensive intervention program is required to provide support and assistance to help immigrants overcome their psychological distresses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Individual differences in core affect variability and their relationship to personality and psychological adjustment.

How people's feelings change across time can be represented as trajectories in a core affect space defined by the dimensions of valence and activation. In this article, the authors analyzed individual differences in within-person affective variability defined as characteristics of core affect trajectories, introducing new ways to conceptualize affective variability. In 2 studies, participants provided multiple reports across time describing how they were feeling in terms of core affect. From these data, characteristics of participants' core affect trajectories were derived. Across both studies, core affect variability was negatively related to average valence, self-esteem, and agreeableness, and it was positively related to neuroticism and depression. Moreover, spin, a measure of how much people experienced qualitatively different feelings within the core affect space, was related more consistently to trait measures of adjustment and personality than other measures of within-person variability, including widely used measures of within-person single-dimension standard deviations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The Moral Dimensions of Globalization.

Responds to the comments by L. T. Hoshmand (see record 2003-08988-012) and J. Aros (see record 2003-08988-013) on the article by J. Arnett (see record 2002-18352-003) regarding the psychology of globalization. In this response, Arnett discusses the moral implications of globalization. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Profiling retirees in the retirement transition and adjustment process: Examining the longitudinal change patterns of retirees' psychological well-being.

The author used role theory, continuity theory, and the life course perspective to form hypotheses regarding the different retirement transition and adjustment patterns and how different individual and contextual variables related to those patterns. The longitudinal data of 2 samples (n? = 994; n? = 1,066) from the Health and Retirement Survey were used. Three latent growth curve patterns of retirees' psychological well-being were identified as coexisting in the retiree samples through growth mixture modeling (GMM) analysis. On the basis of the latent class membership derived from GMM, retiree subgroups directly linked to different growth curve patterns were profiled with individual (e.g., bridge job status) and contextual variables (e.g., spouse working status). By recognizing the existence of multiple retiree subgroups corresponding to different psychological well-being change patterns, this study suggests that retirees do not follow a uniform adjustment pattern during the retirement process, which reconciles inconsistent previous findings. A resource perspective is further introduced to provide a more integrated theory for the current findings. The practical implications of this study are also discussed at both individual level and policy level. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The association between threat appraisals and psychological adjustment in partners of people with spinal cord injuries.

Objective: To explore the psychological factors associated with adjustment in partners of people with spinal cord injuries (SCIs). Participants and Design: Forty partners of people with SCIs. The study had a cross-sectional design. Main Outcome Measures: Beck Depression Inventory, the State Trait Anxiety Inventory Form Y-1, Social Provisions Scale, COPE, and an appraisal scale. Results: Approximately one third of partners reported levels of anxiety and depressive symptoms above the clinical cut-off points indicating elevated levels of emotional distress. Factors hypothesized to account for levels of emotional distress on the basis of the cognitive-appraisal model of stress and coping were found to be explanative. In particular, high threat appraisal, higher use of avoidance (emotion-focused) coping, and lack of approach (problem-focused) coping were found to predict higher levels of anxiety and depressive symptoms. Conclusions: Partners of people with SCIs are at risk of emotional distress. Factors that might help identify at-risk partners are identified and psychological interventions that might help partners are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)