Distancing, self-esteem, and subjective well-being in head and neck cancer.

Background: Distancing (i.e. construing oneself as dissimilar to a negatively-stereotyped group) preserves self-esteem and may benefit other domains of subjective well-being.

Negative cancer stereotypes and disease-specific self-concept in head and neck cancer.

Background: Life-threatening diseases, such as head and neck cancer (HNCa), can stimulate the emergence of a new disease-specific self-concept. We hypothesized that (i) negative cancer-stereotypes invoke distancing, which inhibits the adoption of a disease-specific self-concept and (ii) patient characteristics, disease and treatment factors, and cancer-related stressors moderate the phenomenon.

Methods: Head and neck cancer outpatients (N = 522) completed a semantic-differential measure of disease-specific self-concept (perceived similarity to the 'cancer patient') and other self-report measures in structured interviews.

The burden of stress in head and neck cancer.

Background: Head and neck cancer (HNCa) introduces numerous stressors. We developed the Cancer-Related Stressors Checklist (CRSC), which documents exposure to seven categories of common stressors and emotional distress. We surveyed HNCa survivors and examined associations among exposure to cancer-related stressors, illness intrusiveness (i.