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Biomedical subjects

S A Murphy

Publications and source records attributed to S A Murphy.

94 records · Page 6Linked to original sources
PubMedDate not supplied

Mental distress and recovery in a high-risk bereavement sample three years after untimely death.

Recovery from postdisaster bereavement was the primary concern of this longitudinal study: would levels of mental distress and recovery reported 1 year following a natural disaster be better predictors of mental distress and recovery reported 3 years postdisaster than demographic variables, concurrent life stress, and mediating factors? The 119 bereaved and control participants studied in 1981, one year following the 1980 volcanic eruption of Mount Saint Helens, were recontacted in 1983; of these, 85 consented to follow-up. The 1983 data collection consisted of identical measurement tools and procedures used in 1981. Three regression analyses addressed prediction of mental distress and recovery. The first two analyses compared disaster-bereaved and nondisaster-loss controls; the third pertained only to the bereaved. For the bereaved/control comparisons, 1981 levels of mental distress, age, sex, education, and 1983 levels of negative life stress, self-efficacy, and social support were predictors of the dependent variable, mental distress. For the bereaved group, 1981 mental distress and 1983 self-efficacy scores were the only significant predictors of 1983 mental distress. In the control group, two additional variables, sex and concurrent negative life stress, were also significant predictors of 1983 mental distress. In the final regression analysis, predictors of self-rated recovery, importance of the deceased person rated by the bereaved 1 year postdisaster, and beliefs of preventability of death reported 3 years postdisaster were predictors of 1983 recovery. Only importance of the deceased person was a significant predictor in the latter analysis. Results suggest that recovery is a lengthy process and that much remains to be learned about influencing factors.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Identification of postdisaster bereavement risk predictors.

Investigators have focused primarily on the bereavement experiences of widows and parents of deceased infants. In this study, subjects were 69 bereaved close family members and friends of deceased disaster victims and 50 control subjects. Six variables, not examined before, were entered in a series of hierarchical step-wise regression equations to determine their ability to predict health outcomes. The six variables were gender, age, concurrent life stress, perception of the prior relationship between the bereaved and deceased as central or peripheral, perception of catastrophic death as preventable or unpreventable, and perception of social support. The three health outcomes were depression, somatization, and physical health status. Results indicated that the six selected variables accounted for 48% of the variance in predicting depression, 39% in predicting somatization, and 35% in predicting physical health status in the bereaved group. Concurrent negative life stress was the most important single predictor in all three health outcomes in both groups of subjects.

Adult↗