Coping Strategies

This milestone text provides a comprehensive and state-of-the art overview of perfectionism theory, research, and treatment from the past 25 years, with contributions from the leading researchers in the field. The book examines new theories and perspectives including the social disconnection model of perfectionism and the 2 × 2 model of perfectionism. It also reviews empirical findings, with a special focus on stress, vulnerability, and resilience, and examines perfectionism in specific populations. Finally, it considers how perfectionism relates to physical health and psychophysiological processes and introduces new approaches to effective prevention and treatment. By increasing our understanding of perfectionism as a complex personality disposition and providing a framework for future explorations, this landmark publication aims to promote further research in this field. It will be invaluable reading for academics, students, and professionals in personality psychology, clinical and counselling psychology, applied psychology and related disciplines.

Quite often, when people hear the word “trigger” in a therapeutic context, one may immediately think of substance use and “relapse triggers”. Although substance use is part of this discussion for this exercise, it is important to consider that the idea of feeling “triggered” can also relate to many mental and emotional situations and disorders.

The purpose of this study is to examine the psychological reflections on the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic and how individuals coped with the epidemic. This research was carried out using the exploratory sequential mixed method where qualitative and quantitative patterns were used consecutively. In Study 1, phenomenological design was preferred in order to discover and explain how Covid-19 phenomenon is experienced by individuals and its psychological reflections on their daily life. The data of the study were collected through an online focus group interview and open-ended questions sent to the participants via Internet. Study 1 included 30 participants (x ̅ =37,5), 14 females and 16 males. According to the results of the research the Covid-19 epidemic experience and the psychological reflections of the epidemic are explained in the themes of Meeting the Reality of the Coronavirüs-A Different Experience, Changing the Style of Life in Corona Days, Coping with Coronavirus Fear, and Post-Epidemic Growth. Due to the Covid-19 epidemic, social life, close relationships, and economic life of people have been adversely affected, and their life routines have changed. The risk of epidemics triggered individuals' emotions such as fear, anxiety, boredom, and anger. It was revealed that the participants used cognitive, transcendental, relational, and behavioral coping strategies to deal with the fear of pandemic. It has also been observed that the Covid-19 pandemic has led to positive progress in participants' lives such as self-awareness, self-development, positive relationship and a calm/regular life. In Study 2, it is aimed to develop the Coping with the Outbreak Scale and to examine its psychometric properties. Study 2 included 484 participants (x ̅ =27,8). Based on the literature searches and the Pandemic Coping theme emerged in Study 1, the scale items were written, and validity and reliability were started by getting expert viewpoints. As a result of the analysis, it was seen that the Coping with the Outbreak Scale was a valid and reliable measurement tool. When findings of the study were analyzed in terms of gender variable, the cognitive coping and transcendental coping sub-dimensions and Fear of Covid-19 Scale scores of women were found to be significantly higher compared to men. In addition, it was observed that the participants with higher Covid-19 fear had higher cognitive, transcendental, and relational

The aim of this study was to assess Australian girls' beliefs and feelings about menarche and menstruation using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies. Eighty-seven Grade 6 girls were interviewed and completed questionnaires, including both self-report and projective measures, relating to pubertal status, attitudes to and knowledge about menstruation. Results showed knowledge to be limited, with evidence of incorrect and negative myths about menstruation. Attitudes to menstruation were characterized by embarrassment, discomfort, and ambivalence about growing up. Themes in story completion tasks further reflected these attitudes, along with shame and anxiety, linked periods with incapacity or illness, and expressed the norm of periods as events which require the use of deception and denial as coping strategies. Mature problem-solving approaches to the hypothetical situations in the stories were rare. Factor analysis of the attitudinal and knowledge data revealed four factors — Comfort through Knowledge; Negative Feelings: Discomfort through Knowledge; and Independence — which were discussed in terms of the ambivalent social construction placed on menstruation.

This study examined the effect of the You Can Do It! Education (YCDI) cognitive-behavioural intervention program on the emotional resilience of students in grades 4 to 6 who were identified with achievement, behavioural, social and/or emotional challenges. 61 students were randomly assigned to either small groups receiving an eight week YCDI cognitivebehavioural intervention or small groups receiving “eclectic” counselling other than cognitivebehavioural. Results indicated a positive impact of the YCDI program on the resilience items contained in the ACER Social and Emotional Well-Being Surveys (student self-report; teacher survey) with no positive impact found for students receiving “eclectic” counselling. Results are discussed in terms of the need for social and emotional learning programs that explicitly teach emotional resilience skills. Children of all ages face situations on a daily basis that can evoke negative feelings of anger, anxiety and sadness. The failure to develop ag...

Expressive writing, which involves disclosing one's deepest thoughts and feelings about a stressful life event by using a first-person perspective, has been linked to gains in health and well-being, though effect sizes range widely. Assuming a third-person perspective is a natural and effective way of coping with highly distressing events. Therefore, the current study examined whether a distanced, third-person approach to expressive writing might be more beneficial than a traditional, first-person intervention for high baseline levels of event-linked intrusive thinking. Randomly assigned participants wrote expressively about traumatic life events by using a first-person or third-person-singular perspective. Linguistic analyses showed that assuming a first-person perspective is linked to higher levels of in-text cognitive engagement, whereas a third-person perspective is linked to lower cognitive engagement. However, in a context of higher levels of intrusive thinking, third-pers...

This research examined the contributions of active and passive coping for health problems, and meaning-based coping, to positive psychosocial functioning in a sample of 100 individuals in residential care with a mean age of 83.11 years old. Study participants resided in skilled care, intermediate care, or assisted living facilities. Based on interview data collected on site in participants' residential settings, hierarchical multiple regression analyses revealed that active and passive coping and meaning-based coping had separate influences on measures of positive psychosocial functioning. Active coping was correlated with higher positive affect, whereas passive coping was associated with higher negative affect and self-acceptance. Positive reappraisal, a meaning-based coping strategy, was uniquely associated with higher positive affect, positive social relations, and self-acceptance. Positive religious coping was not independently associated with positive psychosocial function...

To investigate (i) the differential changes in premenstrual symptoms, mood, cognitions, and coping strategies during two treatments [cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) and fluoxetine] for premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) and (ii) the characteristics of those with good vs. poor outcome post treatment and at 1 year follow-up. Premenstrual symptoms, mood (Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, HADS), causal attributions, and use of cognitive and behavioural coping strategies were examined during 6 months of both treatments. The two treatment groups were then combined and divided on the basis of good vs. poor outcome posttreatment and at 1 year follow-up. Baseline measures were used to predict posttreatment outcome, and baseline and posttreatment measures were examined when attempting to predict outcome at 1 year follow-up. Both treatments were equally effective at the end of 6 months (prospective daily diary measure). Fluoxetine treatment had a more rapid effect and greater impa...

Assessment of quality of life in patients with head and neck cancer presents many challenges to the clinician, especially because of the profound physical impact of disease on everyday functioning, including eating, breathing, and speech. Various assessment measures are reviewed here, and recommendations for their use under particular circumstances are outlined. General, disease-specific, site-specific, modular (both disease- and site-specific), and treatment-specific instruments are described. Other issues addressed in this review include frequency and duration of assessment, patient versus interviewer administration, and the effect of coping strategies on results.

This study was designed to examine coping strategies for relational aggression. Ninety-eight female middle-and high-school students completed the Revised Ways of Coping Scale (Folk-man & Lazarus, 1985) and reported characteristics of a relational aggressive act of ...

The purpose of this paper is to compare and contrast the experiences from four major recipients of food aid (India, Bangladesh, Ethiopia and Zambia) in normal time and after a natural disaster and draw implications for the design of effective food aid and food security policies in Africa. The study summarizes the food and agricultural policies and medium-term outcomes regarding food production, trade, markets, consumption and safety nets, as well as the policy responses to food emergencies. The experiences of the study countries suggest that food aid that supports building of production and market enhancing infrastructure, is timed to avoid adverse price effects on producers, and is targeted to food insecure households can play a positive role in enhancing food security. However, food aid is not the only, or in many cases, the most efficient means of addressing food insecurity. In many cases private markets can more effectively address shortfalls in food availability and cash transf...

In an exploratory study, the relationships between two major concepts in psychological adjustment, coping strategies and defense mechanisms, were investigated. Sport competition is an example of a real-world context in which to investigate people’s responses to stressful situations. The extent to which participants reported different uses of coping strategies and defense mechanisms was assessed in terms of performance. Twenty-six elite kayakers were classified into one of two groups, depending on the discrepancy between their standard performance and their performance in competition. Correlations were found between the coping strategies of seeking social support, positive reappraisal/planful problem solving and mature defenses and between the coping strategy of distancing/avoidance and immature defenses. The results of multivariate and univariate analyses confirmed a significantly different use of coping strategies and defense mechanisms between the two performance groups. In light of these findings, certain recommendations in terms of methodology and application appear warranted. It seems important to take into account both coping strategies and defense mechanisms to improve the process of adjustment to sport performance.

Objective: There has been little research on women who are parenting while they experience pain and none of this research has focused on mothers with young children. The purpose of this study was to consider relational coping strategies generated by mothers that they used when parenting young children and experiencing pain.Methods: Two-hundred sixty-two mothers participated in this survey research; 171

HIV/AIDS is a key concern in South Africa. However, its impact cannot be examined in isolation of other stresses, such as food insecurity, high climate variability, market fluctuations, and poor governance. In this paper, we present an agent-based simulation model of the social impacts of HIV/AIDS in villages in the Vhembe district, Limpopo Province, South Africa. It has been developed in the context of the CAVES (Complexity, Agents, Vulnerability, Evidence, and Scale) project. It is our understanding that modelling the complex interactions at the individual and household level will enable stakeholders to better understand the impact of stressors and potential coping strategies at the community level. The model and its preliminary results are presented to motivate discussion among the social science community.

Punktem wyjścia przeprowadzonych przez nasz zespół badań były niepokojące statystyki dotyczące skuteczności programów aktywizacji zawodowej oraz zwiększająca się ilość osób wracających do uzależnienia lub bezdomności po zakończeniu leczenia. Z danych dotyczących losów osób kończących leczenie w placówkach Monar i Markot wynika, że problemem nie jest znalezienie pracy, lecz stopniowe wycofywanie się tych osób z życia zawodowego i społecznego.
Celem przeprowadzonych przez nasz zespół badań była próba ustalenia głębokości deficytów w zakresie:(1) zdolności do znajdowania rozwiązań oraz wytrwałości w realizowaniu podjętych działań, (2) umiejętności interpersonalnych, (3) umiejętności kontrolowania, rozpoznawania i wykorzystywania emocji w rozwiązywaniu problemów, (4) uruchamiania adekwatnych i efektywnych sposobów radzenia sobie ze stresem u beneficjentów ośrodków Monar i Markot.

Investigation on the mental health of HIV-positive immigrants is severely limited. We examine the independent and combined effects of HIV symptom and coping resources on depressive symptoms among HIV-positive immigrants (n = 259). Ordinary Least Squares regression models were estimated with data from a survey of clinical and social-psychological outcomes in people receiving treatment for HIV infection. We tested for the impact of two HIV-related stressors, one life events stressor and three buffering resources on depressive symptoms, controlling for thirteen demographic, clinical and acculturative factors. HIV-related stressors were found to be positively related to depressive symptom severity. Coping resources, namely self-mastery, mediate the relationships between HIV-related stressors and depressive symptoms. Results from this study provide the first empirical assessment of stress processes for immigrants living with HIV. Although more research is needed to understand mental health among HIV-positive immigrants, the study results suggest that health care providers focus on self-mastery enhancement among HIV-positive immigrants.

Background Intellectual disabilities often create a
state of chronic stress for both the person concerned
and their significant others (family, caregivers). The
development of stress management methods is
therefore important for the reduction of stress in
persons with intellectual disability. The aim of this
experiment was to investigate the effect of slow-paced
breathing on stress symptoms experienced by
adolescents with intellectual disabilities during a
cognitive task under time pressure.
Method Fourteen adolescents with intellectual
disabilities (Mage = 17.39 years, range 15–19 years)
took part in two laboratory sessions – a slow-paced
breathing session (experimental condition) and an
audiobook session (control condition) – the order of
which was counterbalanced across participants. Vagal
tone was measured through heart rate variability to
index stress management.
Results No difference in vagal tone was observed at
baseline between experimental and control
conditions. Compared with the control condition,
vagal tone was significantly higher during the
experimental condition.
Conclusions The slow-paced breathing task
enhanced stress management to a greater extent than
did listening to an audiobook. Slow-paced breathing
seems to be an easy to learn stress management
technique that appears as an effective auxiliary
method of lowering stress in adolescents with
intellectual disabilities.

This study examined the role of pro-victim attitudes, personal responsibility, coping responses to observations of bullying, and perceived peer normative pressure in explaining defending the victim and passive bystanding behavior in bullying. A total of 462 Italian early adolescents (mean age = 13.4 years, SD = 9 months) participated in the study. The behaviors were measured through two informants: each individual student and the teachers. The findings of a series of hierarchical regressions showed that, regardless of the informant, problem solving coping strategies and perceived peer normative pressure for intervention were positively associated with active help towards a bullied peer and negatively related to passivity. In contrast, distancing strategies were positively associated with passive bystanding, whereas they were negatively associated with teacher-reported defending behavior. Moreover, self-reported defending behavior was positively associated with personal responsibility for intervention, but only under conditions of low perceived peer pressure. Finally, the perception of peer pressure for intervention buffered the negative influence of distancing on passive bystanding tendencies. Future directions are discussed.