A Validation Study of the Mini-IPIP Five-Factor Personality Scale in Adults With Cancer.

The Mini International Personality Item Pool (Mini-IPIP) is a brief measure of the Five-Factor Model of personality with documented validity in healthy samples of adults and could be useful for assessing personality in patient populations such as individuals with cancer. The purpose of this study was to examine the psychometric properties of the Mini-IPIP in 2 samples of adults with cancer. A sample of 369 (Sample 1) and a sample of 459 (Sample 2) adults with cancer completed an online survey including the Mini-IPIP.

Stigma Consciousness Modulates Cortisol Reactivity to Social Stress in Women.

The aim of the current study was to examine whether stigma consciousness shapes cortisol responses to social stress among women in the lab. Undergraduate women ( = 45) completed background measures and then participated in a public speaking task, with assessments of cortisol prior to the stressor as well as 20- and 40-minutes post stressor onset. Results from multilevel models revealed that women higher in stigma consciousness evidenced blunted cortisol reactivity following social stress across the study session compared to women lower in stigma consciousness.

Minority stress and inflammatory mediators: covering moderates associations between perceived discrimination and salivary interleukin-6 in gay men.

Physical health disparities by sexual orientation are widespread yet under-investigated. Drawing upon theories of biological embedding of social adversity, we tested whether minority stress (in the form of perceived discrimination) is associated with salivary interleukin-6 (IL-6), an inflammatory mediator. Furthermore, we examined whether covering, a strategy involving downplaying a stigmatized social identity, modified this association.

Perceived Discrimination and Social Relationship Functioning among Sexual Minorities: Structural Stigma as a Moderating Factor.

Work on structural stigma shows how public policy affects health outcomes for members of devalued groups, including sexual minorities. In the current research, structural stigma is proposed as a moderating variable that strengthens deleterious associations between perceived discrimination and social relationship functioning. Hypotheses were tested in two cross-sectional studies, including both online (N = 214; Study 1) and community (N = 94; Study 2) samples of sexual minority men and women residing throughout the United States.

Disparities in Social Health by Sexual Orientation and the Etiologic Role of Self-Reported Discrimination.

Some past work indicates that sexual minorities may experience impairments in social health, or the perceived and actual availability and quality of one's social relationships, relative to heterosexuals; however, research has been limited in many ways. Furthermore, it is important to investigate etiological factors that may be associated with these disparities, such as self-reported discrimination. The current work tested whether sexual minority adults in the United States reported less positive social health (i.

Social Stigma and Sexual Minorities' Romantic Relationship Functioning: A Meta-Analytic Review.

To bolster knowledge of determinants of relationship functioning among sexual minorities, the current meta-analysis aimed to quantitatively review evidence for the association between social stigma and relationship functioning as well as examine potential moderators. Thirty-five studies were identified, including 130 effect sizes (39 independent; N = 10,745). Across studies, evidence was found for a small but significant inverse association between social stigma and relationship functioning.

Explaining Extremity in Evaluation of Group Members: Meta-Analytic Tests of Three Theories.

A meta-analysis that included more than 1,100 effect sizes tested the predictions of three theoretical perspectives that explain evaluative extremity in social judgment: complexity-extremity theory, subjective group dynamics model, and expectancy-violation theory. The work seeks to understand the ways in which group-based information interacts with person-based information to influence extremity in evaluations. Together, these three theories point to the valence of person-based information, group membership of the evaluated targets relative to the evaluator, status of the evaluators' ingroup, norm consistency of the person-based information, and incongruency of person-based information with stereotype-based expectations as moderators.

Sex differences in cardiovascular health: does sexism influence women's health?

This commentary provides a brief overview of theory and research that supports the idea that sexism may be related to the disproportionate negative cardiovascular health outcomes in women. It describes sexism as a stressor and outlines its association with a variety of health outcomes as evidence for why sex disparities should be examined within the context of pervasive inequities. To date, population-based studies have not explicitly examined the relationship between sexism and cardiovascular disease, but smaller studies have yielded fairly consistent results.

Perceived discrimination as a stressor for close relationships: identifying psychological and physiological pathways.

Approaching the inverse association between perceived discrimination and close relationship functioning from a stress and coping framework, we propose and test a novel model incorporating psychological (emotion dysregulation) and physiological (chronic inflammation) pathways. Analyses of data from a sample of African American participants (N = 592) enrolled in the Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) study revealed support for the proposed model. Specifically, results from structural equation modeling analyses showed that perceived discrimination was indirectly associated with increased emotion dysregulation (venting and denial) through stressor appraisals and directly associated with increased inflammation (interluekin-6, e-selectin and c-reactive protein).

Predictors of depressive symptoms among breast cancer patients during the first year post diagnosis.

It is important to identify predictors of psychological health among breast cancer patients that can be relatively easily identified by medical care providers. This article investigates the role of one class of such potential predictors: easily identified demographics that have potential social and/or practical implications. Specifically, we examined whether income, marital status, presence of children in the home, education, travel distance, age and rurality interact with time to predict psychological health over the first year post diagnosis.

Social roles, basic need satisfaction, and psychological health: the central role of competence.

The authors propose that competence need fulfillment within valued role domains (i.e., spouse, parent, worker) will account, in part, for associations between autonomy and relatedness need fulfillment and psychological health.

The feasibility and effectiveness of expressive writing for rural and urban breast cancer survivors.

Purpose/objectives: To determine the feasibility and effectiveness of implementing an in-home expressive-writing intervention among breast cancer survivors living in urban and rural areas.

Design: Women who had completed radiation therapy were selected to participate in either expressive writing or a usual-care control condition.

Setting: All materials were completed in the privacy of participants' homes.

The influence of breast cancer survivors' perceived partner social support and need satisfaction on depressive symptoms: a longitudinal analysis.

The present study examines the ways in which breast cancer survivors' perceptions of emotional and instrumental social support from an intimate partner and need satisfaction in their partner role influence depression during and after breast cancer treatment. Our sample was comprised of 163 women who were an average of 57 years old, mostly White/Caucasian, and diagnosed primarily with early-stage breast cancer. Longitudinal data were analysed using both multilevel and structural equation modelling.

Rural breast cancer patients, coping and depressive symptoms: a prospective comparison study.

Many studies have revealed that individual differences in coping responses to the diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer are associated with psychological adjustment. The vast majority of these studies, however, focus exclusively on urban breast cancer survivors despite that rural breast cancer survivors are likely to have distinct experiences both in general and in relation to breast cancer. The current study quantitatively examined the coping strategies employed by both rural and urban breast cancer patients while they were undergoing radiation therapy.

Rural and urban breast cancer patients: health locus of control and psychological adjustment.

Objective: This study examines the moderating influence of rural residence on the associations between health locus of control (HLC) beliefs and psychological well-being.

Method: Two hundred and twenty-four breast cancer patients were surveyed.

Results: The results revealed that rurality interacted with HLC beliefs in predicting psychological adjustment.

Satisfaction with health care, psychological adjustment, and community esteem among breast cancer survivors.

The present survey study examines whether satisfaction with health care predicts breast cancer patients' psychological adjustment and esteem for their communities. Forty-nine women undergoing radiation therapy for breast cancer completed measures of satisfaction with health care, psychological well-being, community esteem, depression, perceived health status, and demographics. As predicted, the results showed that breast cancer survivors' satisfaction with their health care was predictive of their psychological well-being even when controlling for relevant variables such as depression and health status.

The breast cancer experience of rural women: a literature review.

This report is a review of studies that focus on rural breast cancer survivorship. It includes a total of 14 studies using large databases and 27 other studies using qualitative and quantitative methods. In our review of this literature, we identified four broad themes, including access to treatment and treatment type, medical providers and health information, psychosocial adjustment and coping, and social support and psychological support services.