Appraisal of control and coping with air-raids.
This study investigated the appraisal of control (secondary appraisal) and coping as reactions to the air-raids in the city of Zagreb. Coping was assessed with the Croatian version of Ways of Coping (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984) and secondary appraisal was operationalized as control over the occurrence and over the outcome/consequences of the air-raid. The hypotheses that appraisal of low control would yield more emotion-focused and passive coping, and that appraisal of high control would be linked with problem-focused and active coping, were not confirmed. The results were interpreted in terms of so-called emotional habituation. Additionally, some unique characteristics of the air-raid were identified and explained as the key variables in the interpretation of the obtained results: an air-raid is a very specific stressful situation, it is homogeneous in content, and it is a chronic and repeated stressor. The problems with generalization of these data to all stressful events were pointed out.
Arambasic
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Department of Psychology, University of Zagreb, Croatia.
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000328:Adult; D017523:Croatia; D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D006185:Habituation, Psychophysiologic; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008297:Male; D011340:Problem Solving; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000209:etiology / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000523:psychology*; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology*; D014495:Universities; D014504:Urban Health; D014857:Warfare