Three of the most dreaded words in the English language are, "You have cancer." So threatening is the disease that the diagnosis alone can produce a severe psychological wound requiring treatment of its own. Yet some people cope remarkably well.
Why? Notre Dame Professor of Psychology Thomas Merluzzi says, "One of the keys to coping is a person's judgment as to how well she will respond to a given situation, something psychologists call `self-efficacy.' Those with high efficacy expectations feel they have the necessary reserves to meet the challenges, while those with low efficacy may feel overwhelmed."
Merluzzi, whose wife and mother both died of cancer, is attempting to develop an objective measure of self-efficacy both to examine coping behavior from a theoretical perspective and to help teach coping skills.
Among the factors that affect self-efficacy in coping with cancer are the patient's age, extensiveness of social support, and the physical effect of the disease. Merluzzi was surprised to find that religious practices didn't seem to bear directly on self-efficacy.
The Notre Dame psychologist found that older patients tended to be more confident about their ability to cope with the disease. "Older people have a lifetime of experiences to draw upon," Merluzzi says. "They've faced other tough situations."