Coping strategies adopted by caregivers of children with autism in the Limpopo Province, South Africa.

Background: Emotion- and problem-focused coping strategies are frequently employed by caregivers of autistic children to increase their general well-being and resilience to the stress of raising the child. Although these strategies cannot directly address the situation, it is useful for handling stressful situations that cannot change. Objectives: The study seeks to explore and understand the emotion- and problem-focused strategies that caregivers use to cope with the challenges of raising a child with autism. Method: This was a qualitative, exploratory and descriptive research study. Twenty-eight caregivers were purposive-convenient sampled from the public special schools where their autism spectrum disorder (ASD) children are schooling. Semi-structured interviews were used to gather data, which were then transcribed and subjected to thematic analysis. Results: Positive emotion-focused strategies include positive reappraisal, reframing and acceptance. Negative emotion-focused strategies include denial, emotional release, cognitive distortion, self-isolation, overprotection, negative self-talk, punishment and religion. Problem-focused coping strategies include active and adaptive coping, peer group, professional support and social support. Conclusion: The coping methods that have been identified can be integrated into intervention programmes and serve as a guide for specialised institutions that offer more extensive knowledge and assistance to families who are caring for children with ASD. Contribution: The study contributes to understanding the emotion- and problem-focused strategies adopted by rural caregivers in managing their emotions, interpretation of the situation and adjusting to the demands of raising an autistic child.

Coping strategies mediated the relationship between perceived stress and hair cortisol among socioeconomically marginalized parents.

Objective: This study aimed to (1) examine coping strategies and their relationship with demographics, perceived stress, and hair cortisol; and (2) explore whether coping partially mediated the relationship between perceived stress and hair cortisol. Methods: Baseline data from 191 socioeconomically marginalized parents enrolled in two community-based clinical trials were used. The IBM SPSS Statistics Version 27 and Mplus Version 8 were used for data analyses. Results: Parents' engagement in various coping strategies differed by age, ethnicity, race, marital status, education level, and number of children living in the household. Parents' use of problem-focused (instrumental support, planning), emotion-focused (venting, self-blame), and avoidant coping (self-distraction, denial, behavioral disengagement) increased from having low to moderate stress. However, when perceived stress increased from moderate to high, their use of emotion-focused and avoidant coping increased significantly, but problem-focused coping did not. Emotion-focused coping lowered the influence of perceived stress on hair cortisol, while avoidant coping increased the relationship between perceived stress and hair cortisol. Conclusions: Although needing future investigation with longitudinal studies, the results suggest the need of promoting adaptive emotion-focused coping (emotional support, venting, and humor) to help socioeconomically marginalized parents manage their appraised overwhelming and uncontrollable stressors of food, house, and income insecurity.

EMOTIONAL DYSREGULATION, COPING STRATEGIES AND POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS SYMPTOMS AMONG ADOLESCENTS LIVING AT LINE OF CONTROL (LOC).

BACKGROUND: The current research investigates the relationship between Emotional Dysregulation, Coping Strategies and Post-Traumatic Stress Symptoms in adolescents living at Line of Control (LOC). SUBJECTS AND METHODS: Cross-sectional research design was used. The sample of 400 adolescent participants was drawn from different private and government schools by using convenient random sampling. The tools employed for collecting data included Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (Gratz & Roemer 2004), Coping Strategies Scale for Adolescents (Sharif & Saleem 2014), and Post-traumatic Stress Symptoms Checklist (Foa et al. 1993). RESULTS: Results of the study revealed that Emotional Dysregulation and Emotion Focused Coping had a positive and highly significant relationship with Post-traumatic stress symptoms. It was also revealed that Emotional Dysregulation and Emotion Focused Coping positively predicted Post-Traumatic Stress Symptoms. Implications of the study and a few limitations have been discussed. CONCLUSION: The findings of this study will help in regulating adolescents' psychological well-being by helping future researchers in not only understanding the coping strategies these children are employing at the moment but also developing and enhancing in them the healthy coping styles which they are currently not using. Furthermore, the unique nature of non-combatant civilian trauma remains to be understood from several other perspectives, to which this research was only a foundation stone.

Coping with a global crisis-Changes in worries about the Russo-Ukrainian War.

Global crises, such as the Russo-Ukrainian War, can lead to worrying, which in turn can result in health problems when not positively coped with. This study investigates how the worries of Germans are related to general coping strategies. Three consecutive online surveys were distributed from the beginning of March until the beginning of May 2022. The surveys assessed participants' worries about the Russo-Ukrainian War and their use of four coping domains for the two preceding weeks. A total of 175 (54.3% female; Mage  = 33.3, SD = 13.6, 18-66 years) participants completed all three questionnaires. Worries and coping (meaning-focused, problem-focused, social, and avoidance coping) declined over time. Cross-sectionally all coping domains, except meaning-focused coping, correlated positively with initial worries, indicating a higher use of coping strategies when worries were present. In line with this, the use of both social and avoidance coping declined over the course of the study when worries were reduced. Furthermore, a higher initial use of avoidance coping was associated with a stronger decline in worries. Worries and coping strategies both declined following the Russian invasion of Ukraine which suggests that worries and coping strategies adapt to one another over time.

Problem-Focused Coping and Teacher Emotional Violence: A Serial Mediation Analysis.

Although school violence is a serious problem, teacher emotional violence that has short- and long-term detrimental effects on children's development is often overlooked. Considering the potential negative effects, it is important to determine teacher characteristics associated with teacher emotional violence, especially in societies where the prevalence rate of emotional violence is high. The current study investigated the role of teacher stress and burnout and favorable attitudes toward emotional violence in the association between problem-focused coping and teacher emotional violence. Between February and June 2019, a cross-sectional study was conducted in 16 randomly selected secondary schools in Izmir, Turkey. In total, 205 secondary school teachers (64.4% females, Mage = 37.20 years) participated in this study. Participants completed questionnaires that assessed their use of emotional violence, favorable attitudes toward emotional violence, stress and burnout, and problem-focused coping. A serial mediation model was conducted. The model indicated that problem-focused coping was not directly associated with teacher emotional violence. Examination of indirect pathways suggested that favorable attitudes toward emotional violence did not mediate this relationship; however, stress and burnout mediated the link between problem-focused coping and emotional violence. In addition, there was a significant indirect effect from problem-focused coping to emotional violence through stress and burnout and favorable attitudes toward emotional violence. The findings indicate a potential role of teacher characteristics in preventing teacher emotional violence.

A pre-experimental design evaluation of brief harm reduction interventions to improve coping self-efficacy of carers of people with substance use disorder.

BACKGROUND: Globally, the rise in the number of people living with a substance use disorder (SUD) carries a multitude of individual and social health implications for carers and their families, often impacting negatively on their quality of life. Considered from a harm reduction approach, SUD is understood as a chronic protracted, complex health and social condition. From the extant literature, there is no evidence of the harm reduction approach being applied to address the needs of carers/family members who carry the burden of SUD care. This study preliminarily evaluated the Care4Carers Programme. It is a purposively designed set of brief interventions to improve the coping self-efficacy of carers of people with SUD (PwSUD carers) by equipping them to think about ways to exert control over their motivation, behaviours and social environment. METHODS: A pre-experimental, one group pretest-posttest design was implemented with 15 purposively selected participants in the Gauteng Province of South Africa. The intervention was conducted by the lead researcher, a registered social worker. Eight brief intervention sessions were held, over 5-6 weeks at research sites where the participants were identified. The coping self-efficacy scale was completed before and directly after exposure to the programme. Results were analysed using paired t-tests. RESULTS: There were statistically significant (p < .05) improvements in carers' coping self-efficacy, both overall and in respect of each of its constituent components: problem-focused coping, emotion-focused coping and social support strategies. CONCLUSIONS: The Care4Carers Programme improved the coping self-efficacy of carers of people living with SUDs. The application of this programmatic harm reduction intervention to support PwSUD carers should be tested on a larger scale across South Africa.

When others control risks: Others-focused coping with risks from energy projects.

Energy projects can cause various risks over which people have little control, because they are usually developed, implemented, and managed by external parties, such as governments and industry. This study aims to examine how people cope with such externally controlled risks from energy projects, in particular earthquakes induced by gas extraction in their region. Specifically, we studied which factors influence people's intentions to engage in emotion-focused coping aimed at reducing negative emotions, and problem-focused coping aimed at reducing the risks and/or their negative consequences. Extending previous studies, we distinguish two types of problem-focused coping that may be relevant when facing externally controlled risks, namely self-focused coping, in which individual themselves take action to reduce the negative consequences of the risks, and others-focused coping, in which case individuals urge responsible parties to take actions to reduce the risks. Our results show that the three types of coping can be distinguished empirically, and people are likely to engage in others-focused coping. Further, people are most likely to engage in others-focused coping when they experience strong morality-based emotions toward the risks from energy projects, whereas they are most likely to engage in self-focused coping and emotion-focused coping when they experience strong negative consequence-based emotions toward the risks from energy projects.

Coping with incarceration: examining the longitudinal relationship between individual coping styles and mental health outcomes.

BACKGROUND: Experiencing incarceration leads to increased rates of stress that result in a variety of negative physical, mental, and emotional outcomes. However, little research focuses on how individuals vary in their coping responses to stressful life events, like imprisonment. AIMS: This study extends prior research by examining whether changes in coping styles throughout the first year of incarceration influence mental health symptomology at 6- and 12-months post placement. METHODS: Using longitudinal data collected via semi-structured interviews with incarcerated men, this study measures changes in coping strategies and their effect on psychological well-being using the SCL-90-R. Ordinary least squares regression models were used to regress mental health symptomology on residual change scores of coping strategies. RESULTS: Changes in dysfunctional coping during the first 6- and 12-months of placement were associated with increased levels of adverse mental health symptoms. Changes in emotion- and problem-focused coping were not associated with mental health symptomology. CONCLUSIONS: This research illustrates the need to continue exploration into individual responses to stressful events, such as initial incarceration, and suggests that prison systems should be designed in ways that decrease the need to adapt in dysfunctional ways, while providing opportunities for incarcerated people to cope in more productive ways.

Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic Perception on Job Stress of Construction Workers.

Construction has been regarded as one of the most stressful industries, and the COVID-19 pandemic has deteriorated this situation. This research developed and tested a model of the impact of COVID-19 pandemic perception on job stress of construction workers. Both problem-focused and emotion-focused coping were considered as mediators. Empirical data were collected using a detailed questionnaire from the Chinese construction industry. The results showed that pandemic perception was significantly related to psychological and physical stress. Emotion-focused coping was mainly triggered by pandemic fear and job insecurity, while problem-focused coping was mainly triggered by organizational pandemic response. Furthermore, the effects of pandemic fear and organizational pandemic response on job stress were mediated by problem-focused coping. Finally, the theoretical and practical significance, research limitations, and future research directions of this study are discussed.

Positive mental health on Indian track: A complex twist of occupational stress and coping.

Background: The present research aimed to propose a positive mental health model in relation to occupational stress and coping styles among train drivers of Indian railways. Methods: Sample (N = 300) in the age group of 21-59 years, with 40 years of mean age, and the job experience ranged from 3 to 40 years with a mean of 15 years was undertaken through purposive sampling technique. The sample also had a proper representation of the sociodemographic background. The survey-based research design with an empirical approach was used in the present study. Results: The structural equation model revealed the positive mental health of train drivers negatively associated with the experience of occupational stress. Their flourishing state has supported the positive effect of problem-focused coping and the negative effect of social support. However, this relationship with work stress was absent. Through moderation effect, problem-focused coping style strengthens the inverse association between occupational stress and positive mental health. This effect was equivalent across all living areas and income groups at the model as well as the path levels. Conclusions: This study revealed that train drivers who engaged in problem-focused coping could better handle organizational role stress and benefit from improved mental well-being. Therefore, many failures in the railway caused by human error emphasize the importance of this preventive strategy.

How does psychological capital lead to better well-being for students? The roles of family support and problem-focused coping.

Recent studies have shifted the attention on the beneficial role of psychological capital from workplace to academic contexts. Moreover, the mediating role of psychological capital in the effect of social support on student outcomes remains unknown. This topic has become more imperative under the pandemic. The current study aimed to investigate the impact of psychological capital on students' well-being with family support as an antecedent and problem-focused coping as a mediator. Two hundred and eighty-one students completed the questionnaire at two time points. Results of the cross-lagged mediation analysis showed that family support positively predicted psychological capital, psychological capital positively predicted problem-focused coping, and problem-focused coping predicted well-being. Moreover, the chain mediation path between family support and well-being via psychological capital and problem-focused coping was significant. The current findings identify the antecedent and underlying mechanism behind the relationship between psychological capital and well-being, providing insights into psychological capital interventions for students.

Perceived stress and wellbeing in Romanian teachers during the COVID-19 pandemic: The intervening effects of job crafting and problem-focused coping.

This study examines the relationship between teacher perceived stress during the online period of schooling in the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic, and their wellbeing, with job crafting as a mediator, The study also examines the role of problem-focused coping as a moderator in the stress-job crafting relationship. A sample of 360 teachers, 347 females, and 13 males, aged 21-63 years answered to an online survey from October to December 2020. Regression analyses were employed to the data. The results show that the conditional indirect effects of stress on wellbeing are statistically significant for low problem-focused coping (ß = -.06, SE = 0.02, p < .001), whereas for high problem-focused coping the effects are not statistically significant (ß = .01, SE = 0.01, p > .05). The effects of stress on wellbeing are mediated by job crafting for teachers who score low on problem-focused coping.

Intentions to use ride-sourcing services in Vietnam: What happens after three months without COVID-19 infections?

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought new risks and stress for paid transport users worldwide. COVID-19 has changed mobility dynamics worldwide, including low- and middle-income countries (e.g., Vietnam). The present study aims to provide an in-depth understanding of ride-sourcing passengers' behavioural intentions when COVID-19 pandemic management successfully prevented community transmission by extending the TPB with two constructs: perceived virus infection risk and problem-focused coping. Using self-administered questionnaires, data were collected from ride-sourcing customers in Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam). A total of 540 responses were used for validating the proposed theorethical model. The structural equation model results indicate that problem-focused coping is a multi-faceted construct with two dimensions: problem-solving and self-protection. Also, problem-focused coping has the highest total effect on the intention to use ride-sourcing services following a period of COVID-19 suppression (3 months without identified cases). The findings also reveal that attitude partially mediates the link between problem-focused coping and behavioural intention. The results of this study could be used to develop strategies to promote ride-sourcing services in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Smartphone-Based Ecological Momentary Assessment of Coping with Loneliness amid COVID-19 in Germany.

The COVID-19 pandemic may have caused people to feel isolated, left out, and in need of companionship. Effective strategies to cope with such unrelenting feelings of loneliness are needed. In times of COVID-19, we conducted a smartphone-based ecological momentary assessment (EMA) study with 280 lonely participants in Germany over 7 months, where a long and hard second national lockdown was in place. Each participant reported their daily loneliness and coping strategies for loneliness once in the evening for 7 consecutive days. We found that managing emotions and social relationships were associated with decreased feelings of loneliness, while using a problem-focused coping strategy was associated with increased feelings of loneliness amid COVID-19. Interestingly, managing emotions was particularly effective for easing loneliness during the second lockdown. Females tend to use more emotion-focused coping strategies to overcome their loneliness compared to males. Our study highlights the importance of managing emotions against loneliness throughout the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany. Designing technology that provides emotional support to people may be one of the keys to easing loneliness and promoting well-being.

Attachment anxiety and resilience: The mediating role of coping.

In recent research, attachment has been addressed as a core factor that potentially contributes to resilience. However, there is still much to investigate regarding the mechanisms of this relationship. Emotion-focused coping and problem-focused coping strategies may be promising pathways via which attachment associates with resilience. The present study evaluated the role of attachment insecurity (i.e., attachment anxiety and avoidance) in resilience among a Turkish sample during the COVID-19 pandemic. We hypothesized that individuals with high levels of attachment anxiety would experience lower resilience via emotion-focused coping strategies. On the other hand, we did not have a specific hypothesis for attachment avoidance due to contrasting research findings of previous studies. Participants reported their attachment orientation, resilience, and coping strategies. Attachment anxiety was directly and, through both coping strategies, indirectly linked to resilience however attachment avoidance was only indirectly related to resilience through problem-focused coping. The findings indicate that low levels of attachment anxiety and the ability to use problem-focused coping strategies may be associated with greater resilience. The fostering of attachment security may thus reduce the use of emotion-focused strategies and may promote resilience among individuals with high levels of attachment anxiety. Moreover, our study is one of the first to investigate attachment orientations in relevance with coping and resilience during the ongoing pandemic This research has implications regarding the potentials of introducing psycho-educational trainings for better coping strategies in crisis like COVID-19 pandemic.

Linking Employee Resilience with Organizational Resilience: The Roles of Coping Mechanism and Managerial Resilience.

BACKGROUND: Environmental uncertainty has become the normal surviving and development environment for organizations. Resilience is the key to manage the crisis and abrupt crush, and the relationship between employee resilience and organizational resilience still needs to be explored in Chinese context. The study is to uncover the black box between employee resilience and organizational resilience. METHODS: Based on the conservation of resource theory, this study introduced managerial resilience, problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping into the relational mechanism between employee resilience and organizational resilience. The study adopted structural equations, bootstrapping methods, and analyzed 329 multi-point employee-manager matching data as the research basis from high-tech industries, service industries, and traditional manufacturing industries. RESULTS: This study demonstrated that employee resilience is positively associated with organizational resilience; The indirect effects of employee resilience on organizational resilience through problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping were statistically significant; moreover, managerial resilience positively moderated the relation between employee resilience and emotion-focused coping, and it also moderated the indirect effect of employee resilience on organizational resilience through emotion-focused coping. CONCLUSION: This study adds value to the literature by revealing employee resilience boots problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping, resulting in more or less organizational resilience in the context of Chinese enterprises. It is suggested that in the daily management of the organization, we should pay more attention to cultivate and develop employee resilience to improve organizational resilience.

Coping with COVID-19: The Strategies Adapted by Pakistani Students to Overcome Implications.

COVID-19 has speedily immersed the globe with 72+ million cases and 1.64 million deaths, in a span of around one year, disturbing and deteriorating almost every sphere of life. This study investigates how students in Pakistan have coped with the COVID-19. Zung's self-rating anxiety scale (SAS) was used for measuring anxiety and the coping strategies were measured on four strategies i.e., seeking social support, humanitarian, acceptance, and mental disengagement. Among 494 respondents, 61% were females and 77.3% of the students were in the age group of 19-25 years. The study findings indicate that approximately 41 percent of students are experiencing some level of anxiety, including 16% with severe to extreme levels. Seeking social support seemed to be the least preferred coping strategy and that female students seek social support, humanitarian, and acceptance coping strategies more than males. Students used both emotion-based and problem-based coping strategies. The variables of gender, age, ethnicity, level and type of study, and living arrangement of the students were associated with usage of coping strategies. Findings showing that students do not prefer to seek social support. The study outcomes will provide basic data for university policies in Pakistan and the other countries with same cultural contexts to design and place better mental health provisions for students.

The Relationship Between Coping Strategies and Sleep Problems: The Role of Depressive Symptoms.

BACKGROUND: Several studies have proposed that coping strategies are a key predictor of sleep problems. Furthermore, some authors have suggested that depressive symptoms, a factor that is related to both coping strategies and sleep, may play a critical role in this relationship. However, this preliminary research has shown mixed results. PURPOSE: The aim of this research was to study the relationship between coping strategies (i.e., emotion-focused and problem-focused coping) and sleep, and investigate whether this relationship is direct or mediated by depressive symptoms. METHODS: Using a cross-sectional design, we tested this idea in a sample of 723 participants from the Midlife in the United States 2 study (mean age = 54.22 years, age range = 25-74 years, 54.40% females, 95.1% had at least a high school education). We applied mediation analyses with bootstrapped bias-corrected 95% confidence intervals to test total, direct, and indirect effects. Coping and depression were assessed using questionnaires. Objective and subjective sleep quantity and quality were measured using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, sleep diaries, and actigraphy. RESULTS: The results show that low emotion-focused coping and high problem-focused coping are associated with lower depressive symptoms, which, in turn, are associated with better objective and subjective sleep quality. Moreover, greater use of emotion-focused coping is related to more perceived sleep time. CONCLUSIONS: This study sheds light on the process of the development of sleep problems in people who use different coping strategies. It offers explanations for the association between emotion-focused and problem-focused coping and sleep problems, via depressive symptoms.

The Effect of Traumatic Experiences of North Korean Adolescent Refugees upon Their Negative Health Perception: Focusing on Multiple Moderating Effect of Problem-Focused versus Social Support-Focused Coping Strategies.

The health problems of North Korean (NK) refugees living a new life after surviving the dangers of life and death traumas is an issue that must be taken very seriously. Adolescent refugees may be particularly vulnerable to adverse physical and mental health issues because of major physical, cognitive, and psychosocial developmental changes during adolescence. This study examines the positive roles two active coping strategies-problem-focused coping and social support-focused coping-can play in NK refugee adolescents' health self-awareness. The analysis found that "social support-focused coping" alleviates the negative relationship between traumatic experience and health perception, acting as a protective factor. Contrary to our prediction, the protective effect of adopting "problem-focused coping" in this study was not verified. The findings suggest that providing interventions for developing appropriate coping strategies help them live healthier, both physically and mentally, in South Korean society.

Corrigendum: Predicting Well-Being Among the Elderly: The Role of Coping Strategies.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00616.].