Is Optimism an asset in cancer disease?

• Autor(a) principal: Amorim , Liliana
• Data de Publicação: 2009
• Outros Autores: Pereira, M. Graça
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://doi.org/10.31877/on.2009.08.02
• topic: cancro; optimismo; morbilidade psicológica; suporte social; cancer; optimism; psychological morbidity; social support

This study aimed to evaluate the relationship between optimism, psychological morbidity and satisfaction with the social support in a sample of cancer patients. A sample of 46 participants diagnosed with cancer from the Oncology Service at São Marcos Hospital (Braga) participated in the study. Subjects filled the following questionnaires: a Socio-Demographic Questionnaire developed by Pereira and Amorim for the study’s purpose; Life Orientation Test-R (Scheier, Carver & Bridges, 1994); Stress, Depression and Anxiety Scales – 21 (Pais-Ribeiro, Honrado & Leal, 2004a) and the Social Support Satisfaction Scale (Santos, Pais-Ribeiro & Lopes, 2003). The results showed that optimism and psychological morbidity are associated, i.e. oncologic patients with higher levels of optimism present less psychological morbidity. In this sample, married patients present lower levels of depression when compared with single, divorced or widows patients. No associations were found between satisfaction with social support and optimism, however, satisfaction with social support and psychological morbidity were significantly correlated.Implications for intervention are addressed.