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Adaptive style and differences in parent and child report of health‐related quality of life in children with cancer
Author(s) -
Jurbergs Nichole,
Russell Kathryn M. W.,
Long Alanna,
Phipps Sean
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
psycho‐oncology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.41
H-Index - 137
eISSN - 1099-1611
pISSN - 1057-9249
DOI - 10.1002/pon.1195
Subject(s) - psychosocial , quality of life (healthcare) , medicine , clinical psychology , health related quality of life , childhood cancer , style (visual arts) , pediatric cancer , categorization , developmental psychology , psychology , cancer , disease , psychiatry , philosophy , nursing , archaeology , epistemology , pathology , history
The objective of this study was to examine the self‐reported health‐related quality of life (HRQL) of children with cancer, and the consistency between child and parent reports of child HRQL, as a function of the child's adaptive style. Participants included 199 children with cancer, 108 healthy children, and their parents. Children completed self‐report measures of HRQL and adaptive style. Measures of adaptive style were used to categorize children as high anxious, low anxious, defensive high anxious or repressor. Parents completed measures reporting their children's HRQL. Adaptive style was a significant predictor of child‐reported HRQL, particularly on the psychosocial scales, with children identified as repressors reporting the best HRQL. Adaptive style was also predictive of discrepancies between parent and child report of child HRQL. Repressor and low anxious children reported better HRQL than did their parents, while high anxious children reported poorer HRQL, regardless of health status. Adaptive style is a significant determinant of self‐reported HRQL in children, particularly in psychosocial domains, while health status (i.e. cancer patient vs healthy control) is predictive only of physical health domains. Researchers and clinicians should be aware of the impact of child adaptive style when assessing HRQL outcomes using self‐ or parent report. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.