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Coping Styles and Psychopathology-Literature Review

Mohammad Alshaikh

Research Methods in Psychology

Coping Styles and Psychopathology

Coping styles and psychopathology are strongly linked with each other as both of the domains are focusing upon the ideology of the stress. Stress is a situation that leads to cause psychopathology in most of the cases if healthy coping strategies are not employed. If unhealthy and avoidant coping styles are employed then it results in causing psychopathology in most of the cases. There are number of studies that have described the role of coping strategies in lessening the psychopathological impacts of certain coping styles.

Sarwar, Abid, Khan and Sarwar (2020) designed a study to explore the relationship between coping styles and psychopathology in medical students. Emotional intelligence was also taken as a variable in this particular study. The study design was cross-sectional as it focused on assessing the relationship between these different variables in a cross-sectional sample. Data collection process involved purposive, convenient sampling. A total of 210 students with 117 male and 83 female students were selected as sample of the study. Psychopathic deviation and Brief cope inventory was used for the purpose of measurement o the different domains of coping styles and psychopathic deviation. Different sorts of data analysis was done that included correlation, t-test and regression. The results of the study indicated that people with poor coping styles are more prone to developing psychopathologies. The role of emotional intelligence was also described in the study and it emphasize upon the point that those people that do not know about the emotional regulation tend to adopt maladaptive coping strategies thus leading to a point where they develop psychopathology. Lack of adaptive coping skills leads to development of psychopathology and emotional regulation also plays a very important role in that particular instance. When it comes to the development of adaptive coping skills then the role of emotional intelligence can not be denied and it has been very effective. Those individuals that lack in adaptive coping skills leads to increased suicidal ideation as the results of the study indicated.

In another study Jaiswal et al., (2018) explored the association between psychopathology and coping mechanisms in the parents of children with intellectual disability. The sample size consisted of 100 parents that were recruited for the process of data collection. Child psychiatry outpatient department that was run by a teaching hospital was contacted for the purpose of collection of data. For the purpose of measurement of different constructs of the study, parents of children with intellectual disability were interviewed. The Performa that was used for the process of interviewing consisted of semi-structured interview question. In addition to that, a symptom checklist (SCL90R) and Mechanism of Coping Scale (MOCS) were also utilized. With the help of these two scales, the formal assessment was done. The results of the study indicated that most of the parents of children with intellectual disability think of their child’s disability as a major issue and concern for their life. They also tended to emphasize how their own lives revolved around the problem of their children. They tend to take their consideration as same as their own life. The way their own life also got affected by the ailment of their children was also assessed. The results of the study indicated that most of the parents have psychological problems and major part of those problems was neurotic rather than the psychotic one. Depression and somatic problems were reported as the most common and it was present almost all of the parents of the children with intellectual disability. Further results of the study indicated that the use of maladaptive coping skills by parents of the children with intellectual disability resulted in increased psychopathology. the use of avoidant coping skills and in some other cases, the use of emotion-focused coping skills were leading to cause a lot more problems in parents of children with intellectual disability. The overall results lead to the conclusion that children with intellectual disability must be taken care of as a family unit otherwise it may cause a lot more problems for all family members.

Bikmazer et al.,(2019) designed a study to explore the link of coping and psychopathology among children with certain malignancy. In addition, their study aimed to focus on the social support and its role in development of certain coping skills for the individual. The sample for this study consisted of 114 children and adolescents. The age range of the children that were included in the sample lied between nine and fifteen years of age. A schedule was used for the purpose of data collection and this schedule focused on the assessment of affective disorders and schizophrenia for children. Results of the study indicated that around fifty to sixty percent of the children with a chronic disease also had a psychiatric diagnosis. In most of the cases this psychiatric diagnosis was depression, anxiety and other common problems. Coping styles of parents and children that were identified in this particular study were religious in most of the cases. The religious coping resulted in positive interpretation and growth of the individuals. Social support appraisal of children were also included in the study. The results indicated that most of the individuals used religious coping while some other used problem-focused coping. Still there were some that used emotion-focused coping. Those individuals that used problem-focused coping were at very least risk of developing any significant problem. The people that used emotion-focused coping were more prone to develop psychopathology.

Schnieder, King and Delfabro (2018) designed a study to investigate the maladaptive coping styles in adolescents. For the purpose of study, adolescents with gaming disorder symptoms were selected as sample. Sample size consisted of 823 adolescents from secondary schools. For the assessment purpose, cope inventory and DSM-5 checklist was used. Denial and behavioral disengagement were the most common coping styles that were highlighted in the study results as used by most of the adolescents. Internet gaming disorder was associated with the maladaptive coping styles that were used by most of the adolescents. Public health concern because of the internet gaming disorder has been a very significant one and the issues that are caused by maladaptive coping strategies also are highlighted in this study. Those adolescents that used maladaptive coping strategies were at increased risk of developing different psychiatric disorders.

Another study designed by Schagen et al., (2016) investigated the role of coping in a diversified psychiatric population. In addition, they also investigated the role of nightmares in causing these symptoms. Comorbidity of nightmares and maladaptive coping skills was investigated in the study. For the purpose of study, 498 participants were selected and all of the individuals had certain forms of psychiatric disorders. Psychopathology, personality pathology and many different styles of coping were explored in the study. Results indicated that there exists significant differences when it comes to different sorts of coping strategies. Task-oriented coping and avoidance-oriented coping in addition to emotion-focused coping were some of the major coping styles that were employed by the participants. The emotion-focused coping was the most incapable and inadequate coping strategy that resulted in emotional instability and aggravated psychological problems. Overall study results were indicative of the fact that people that uses maladaptive coping skills are at increased risk of developing certain psychological problems.

Moving towards the conclusion of the literature review, it is good to mention that different studies show that people that use maladaptive coping skills are more prone to develop different psychopathologies as compared to individuals that used adaptive coping skills. If proper coping strategies are not employed then it results in causing a lot more problems for individuals thus enhancing the chance of occurrence of psychopathology.

References

Bikmazer, A., Orengul, A., Buyukdeniz, A., Okur, F., Gokdemir, Y., & Perdahli Fis, N. (2019). Coping and psychopathology in children with malignancy and bronchiectasis. Pediatric Pulmonology, 55(1), 214-220. https://doi.org/10.1002/ppul.24534

Jaiswal, S. V., Subramanyam, A. A., Shah, H. R., & Kamath, R. M. (2018). Psychopathology

and coping mechanisms in parents of children with intellectual disability. Indian journal

of psychiatry, 60(3), 312–317. https://doi.org/10.4103/psychiatry.IndianJPsychiatry_259_17

Maftei, A., & Enea, V. (2020). Symptoms of internet gaming disorder and parenting styles in Romanian adolescents. Psihologija, 53(3), 307-318. https://doi.org/10.2298/psi190808008m

Sarwar, N., Abid, S., Sarwar Khan, G., & Sarwar, A. (2020). Relationship between Emotional Intelligence, Coping Styles and Psychopathology among Medical Students in District Peshawar. International Research Journal Of Science And Technology, 88-95. https://doi.org/10.46378/irjst.2020.010203

van Schagen, A., Lancee, J., Swart, M., Spoormaker, V., & van den Bout, J. (2016). Nightmare Disorder, Psychopathology Levels, and Coping in a Diverse Psychiatric Sample. Journal Of Clinical Psychology, 73(1), 65-75. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.22315