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Individual differences in the experience of burden in caring for relatives with dementia: role of personality and mastery
Author(s) -
Helmes Edward,
Green Bev,
Almeida Osvaldo P
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
australasian journal on ageing
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.63
H-Index - 34
eISSN - 1741-6612
pISSN - 1440-6381
DOI - 10.1111/j.1741-6612.2005.00120.x
Subject(s) - dementia , neuroticism , personality , psychology , big five personality traits , caregiver burden , clinical psychology , association (psychology) , exploratory research , perspective (graphical) , multilevel model , psychiatry , medicine , disease , social psychology , pathology , artificial intelligence , machine learning , sociology , anthropology , computer science , psychotherapist
Objective: We explored individual differences in caregiver outcome according to the personality and behavioural style of the carer. Current models of caregiver burden fail to consider such factors.Methods: This cross‐sectional, exploratory study used carer variables of personality traits and mastery and patient variables of cognitive, functional and neurobehavioural status to predict scores on an established measure of burden in a sample of 51 people with dementia and their carers.Results: Hierarchical multiple regression showed a significant association between behavioural disturbance and neuroticism and burden, but not with mastery.Conclusions: The primary findings in this study are that models of caregiver outcome need to take an individual differences perspective in accounting for caregiver mental health risk factors: personality characteristics do play a part in the way caregivers manage this difficult role.