Potentially, the chronic pain condition can damage individuals, their families and society. Coping is a mechanism that has been proposed to help individuals maintain adaptive levels of functioning despite their chronic pain condition. With chronic pain being the condition of interest, this study explored the relationship between coping and adjustment. Of secondary interest was to examine the degree to which those individuals who identify Pain as their primary stressor differ from those who identify a Non-Pain stressor as primary. / Ninety one patients with chronic pain conditions were administered the Revised Ways of Coping Checklist, the Multidimensional Pain Inventory, and a demographics questionnaire. A multivariate multiple regression revealed that coping strategies accounted for approximately 32% of the variance of adjustment dimensions. Separate multiple regression analyses showed that the multivariate relationship can be attributed to the relationships between the five coping strategies and the dimensions of Affective Distress and Activity. Finally, a significant relationship was found between the coping strategy of Wishful Thinking and the adjustment dimension of Affective Distress. / In order to further understand the relationship between coping and adjustment, a canonical correlation was also conducted. One significant root emerged that was comprised of the coping strategies Blame Self, Wishful Thinking, and Avoidance that all loaded positively on the root and the adjustment dimensions of Affective Distress, that also loaded positively, and Support and Activity that loaded negatively. / Two separate multivariate analyses of variance (MANOVA) were conducted to address the second research question regarding the differences between those individuals who identify Pain as their primary stressor from those that identify a Non-Pain stressor as primary. The overall MANOVAs comparing the groups were not significant, thus, the two groups did not appear to differ in terms of both coping and adjustment. / The findings were interpreted from a cognitive-behavioral perspective. From a research perspective the results shed light on the complex condition of chronic pain. From a practitioner point of view, they may provide guidance in the treatment of individuals in pain. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 55-08, Section: B, page: 3574. / Major Professor: F. Donald Kelly. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1994.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_77217 |
| Contributors | O'Connell, Michael John., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 104 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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