Who talks?: The social psychology of illness support groups
Who talks?: The social psychology of illness support groups
复制标题
DOI：
10.1037/0003-066x.55.2.205
复制
发表时间：
2000-02-01
影响因子：
16.4
通讯作者：
Dickerson, SS
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Davison, KP;Pennebaker, JW;Dickerson, SS
更多的美国人尝试通过自助来改变他们的健康行为，而不是通过所有其他形式的专业设计的项目。互助小组对参与者的成本很少或没有，对身心健康具有强大的影响，但人们对互助小组参与医疗保健的模式知之甚少。什么样的疾病经历促使患者寻求彼此的陪伴？为了观察与现实世界相关的社会比较过程，我们对 4 个大都市区（纽约、芝加哥、洛杉矶和达拉斯）和 2 个在线论坛的 20 种疾病类别的支持小组参与情况进行了测量。对于被视为耻辱的疾病（例如艾滋病、酗酒、乳腺癌和前列腺癌），寻求支持的人数最多，而对于不太令人尴尬但同样具有破坏性的疾病（例如心脏病），寻求支持的人数最低。作者讨论了社会比较理论的含义及其在医疗保健中的应用。
More Americans try to change their health behaviors through self-help than through all other forms of professionally designed programs. Mutual support groups, involving little or no cost to participants, have a powerful effect on mental and physical health, yet little is known about patterns of support group participation in health care. What kinds of illness experiences prompt patients to seek each other's company? In art effort to observe social comparison processes with real-world relevance, support group participation was measured for 20 disease categories in 4 metropolitan areas (New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Dallas) and on 2 on-line forums. Support seeking was highest for diseases viewed as stigmatizing (e.g., AIDS, alcoholism, breast and prostate cancer) and was lowest for less embarrassing but equally devastating disorders, such as heart disease. The authors discuss implications for social comparison theory and its applications in health care.