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Exposure to Major Stressors May Reduce Dysfunctional Cognition About Them 1
Author(s) -
Lakey Brian,
McLeister Anan Ruth,
Sirl Kimberly,
Drew Jana Brittain,
Butler Chris
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
journal of applied social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1559-1816
pISSN - 0021-9029
DOI - 10.1111/j.1559-1816.2000.tb02425.x
Subject(s) - dysfunctional family , stressor , psychology , cognition , developmental psychology , affect (linguistics) , clinical psychology , social psychology , psychiatry , communication
Exposure to a given stressor may enhance future resistance to that specific event as well as to stressful events more generally. One mechanism may be that prior exposure decreases dysfunctional beliefs about the specific event or to events in general (i. e., general dysfunctional attitudes). The research described here examined whether exposure to divorce was related to fewer divorce‐specific and general dysfunctional attitudes. Divorced participants reported fewer divorce‐specific dysfunctional attitudes than did happily married participants or married participants considering divorce. Similarly, adult children of divorced parents had fewer divorce‐specific dysfunctional attitudes than did adult children of happily married parents. A different pattern was observed for general dysfunctional attitudes.