Page No 132-140
Shams Un Nisa and Touseef Rizvi
University of Kashmir, Jammu & Kashmir
An emerging area of empirical study in the stress and health literature is the concept
of positive consequences arising as a result of coping with traumatic experiences such
as life-threatening illness. The present study investigated three specific psychosocial
variables (coping styles, personality and social support) in relation to post-traumatic
growth in breast cancer patients. The study was conducted with 176 women with breast
cancer undergoing chemotherapy and coming to the hospital for their routine check-up.
Brief COPE, NEO-FFI, Multidimensional scale of perceived social support (MSPSS),
Post-Traumatic Growth Inventory-Short Form and Baseline Form were used. The results
indicated that conscientiousness, social support from significant other and total social
support emerged as a significant predictor of post-traumatic growth in breast cancer
patients. There was also evidence that active-adaptive coping partially mediated the
conscientiousness-post-traumatic growth relationship and fully mediated the relationship
of social support and post-traumatic growth relationship. The significance of personal
and social variables in psychological interventions aimed at improving the adjustment
and post-traumatic growth of breast cancer patients