Personal Control Beliefs and Causal Attributions in Cancer Patients (Psychological Adjustment).

The relationship of personal control beliefs and causal attributions to adjustment was examined in an exploratory study of 50 acutely ill cancer patients who were part of two experimental treatment protocols that offered the hope of increased survival. The psychological functioning of these patients were also explored in comparison to the general public. Data were gathered by means of individual interviews and questionnaires. The self-reported mental health scores, on the well-validated Mental Health Index (Ware et al., 1979), were not significantly different from the normative sample. Subjects also believed that they were coping better than imagined other individuals with the same illness. Both measures of adjustment were related in meaningful ways to a measure of disease status. A majority of the patients believed that they had at least some control over the course of their cancer. While the association between the amount of personal control patients reported and their adjustment was quite strong, none of the specific cognitions about the type of control patients believed they had was correlated with adjustment. Also, the amount of control patients desired either over their health care and /or their lives was found to be unrelated to adjustment. Over one-half of the sample had some explanation about the cause of their illness. While simply having such a hunch was unrelated to adjustment, several of the specific causal attributions given by the patients were tied to psychological adjustment. When forced to assign responsibility for the cause of their cancer, the overwhelming majority of the patients made attributions to situational factors; none of these assignments of responsibility, however, was correlated with adjustment. Overall, the psychological resiliency of these patients is quite impressive. They seem to utilize a variety of cognitive strategies which allow them to maintain good adjustment. Social workers should become more knowledgeable about the beneficial aspects of such coping efforts. Further research is needed to underst and why some patients do not make use of these effective coping strategies.PhDSocial workUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/161314/1/8702824.pd