Coping in Parkinson's disease: an examination of the coping inventory for stressful situations.
BACKGROUND
Parkinson's disease (PD) brings with it a range of stresses and challenges with which a patient must cope. The type of coping strategies employed can impact upon well-being, although findings from coping studies in PD remain inconsistent. The variety of coping scales used without validation in PD has been cited as a possible cause of this inconsistency. The present study sought to examine the validity of the coping inventory for stressful situations (CISS) in a sample of patients with PD.


METHODS
Five hundred and twenty-five patients with PD were recruited as part of a longitudinal investigation of mood states in PD. Four hundred and seventy-one participants completed the CISS. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to explore the structural validity of the scale. Internal reliability, test-retest reliability, convergent validity and discriminant validity were assessed using Cronbach's alpha, intraclass correlations and Pearson's correlations.


RESULTS
Both three and four factor solutions were examined. The four factor model was found to provide a better fit of the data than the three factor model. The internal reliability, discriminant validity, convergent validity, and test-retest reliability of the CISS scales were shown to be good. Use of emotion-focused coping was associated with greater depression and anxiety whilst, task-oriented coping was associated with better psychological well-being.


CONCLUSIONS
The results provide support for the validity and reliability of the CISS as a measure of coping in patients with PD. Further research into the relationship between coping and well-being is warranted. The identification of helpful and unhelpful coping strategies may guide the development of evidence-based therapies to improve well-being in patients with PD.
Hurt
C S
CS
Department of Psychology, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, London, UK. catherine.hurt@kcl.ac.uk
Thomas
B A
BA
Burn
D J
DJ
Hindle
J V
JV
Landau
S
S
Samuel
M
M
Wilson
K C M
KC
Brown
R G
RG
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010300:Parkinson Disease / Q000523:psychology*; D011581:Psychological Tests; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000523:psychology