Amount of studies on systematic stress and coping in families, using observational model and allowing estimate the impact of disease or disability of one family member on the whole family system is limited. As a model of family adaptation to chronical stress, mechanisms of its contagion and transmission in family, as well as coping we used families of the patients with neurosis.
Participants were 69 families with teenagers (207 people). Mothers in 25 families suffered from neurosis, 44 families with no neurosis.
Using 5717 event sampling, we examined their stress and coping experiences (Perrez, Schoebi, Wilhelm, 2000). Family members were instructed to daily report everyday stressful events, stress emotions, causal attribution, coping and coping outcomes.
Mothers had stronger experiences of non-social family stress (disease, lack of money) and non-social non-family stress (appearance, thoughts about their own future, their negative behavior).
Fathers were strongly affected by personal and family stressors (occupational overload, current or future states of the wife and the child). For their children conflicts with parents and siblings were more pronounced.
Fathers used family coping less – active intervention of other family members that perceived as support. Mothers were more prone to use internal coping and seek of social support. Their children used seldom adequate and internal coping and often – inadequate strategies.
Mother’s neurosis was one of the predictors of father’s causal attributions, his inadequate coping and mental health. Mother’s neurosis was a moderator, decreasing positive impact of mother’s adequate coping on father’s adequate coping. Supported by RFH project 16-06-00228