title: Caregiving styles and anxiety among couples: coping versus not coping with cardiac illness.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  partners' caregiving efforts are not always beneficial to both recipient and provider. Bowlby's conceptualization of caregiving style as a stable predisposition may clarify such caregiving effects. The relationship between caregiving style (compulsive and sensitive) and anxiety among couples coping with cardiac illness and a matching control group not coping with cardiac illness were assessed. We hypothesized that one's compulsive caregiving would associate positively, and one's sensitive caregiving would associate negatively, with one's and one's partner's anxiety across contexts (cardiac and non-cardiac) and gender.
  
  
  METHODS
  A comparative design of 131 couples with a diagnosis of husbands' acute cardiac syndrome and 68 matched couples in the community was applied.
  
  
  METHODS
  The Adult Caregiving Questionnaire and the Brief Symptoms Inventory were administered.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Structural equation modeling revealed that one's compulsive caregiving was positively associated with one's anxiety, across most contexts. Multi-group analyses revealed that the associations between one's compulsive caregiving and one's partner's anxiety levels differed depending on gender and context.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The distress which emerges in an individual who takes on a caregiving role and in his/her partner seems to result not only from the demands of the concrete caregiving situation but also from one's and one's partner's developmental history.
authors.affiliation: a Department of Psychology , Bar-Ilan University , Ramat-Gan , Israel.
authors.forename: Sivan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: George-Levi
authors.affiliation: a Department of Psychology , Bar-Ilan University , Ramat-Gan , Israel.
authors.forename: Noa
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Vilchinsky
authors.affiliation: a Department of Psychology , Bar-Ilan University , Ramat-Gan , Israel.
authors.forename: Eshkol
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Rafaeli
authors.affiliation: b Data-graph, Research and Statistical Counseling , Holon , Israel.
authors.forename: Gabriel
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Liberman
authors.affiliation: c Department of Cardiology , Meir Medical Center , Kefar Saba , Israel.
authors.forename: Abid
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Khaskiaa
authors.affiliation: c Department of Cardiology , Meir Medical Center , Kefar Saba , Israel.
authors.forename: Morris
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Mosseri
authors.affiliation: d Department of Cardiology , Sheba Medical Center , Ramat-Gan , Israel.
authors.forename: Hanoch
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hod
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D001008:Anxiety Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000523:psychology; D001294:Attitude to Health; D017028:Caregivers / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006331:Heart Diseases / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D007557:Israel / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012737:Sex Factors; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires
keywords: Acute coronary syndrome; anxiety; caregiving styles; gender differences; personality