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Personality features, caring burden and mental health of cohabitants of partners with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or dementia
- Authors:
- NORDTUG Bente, KROKSTAD Steinar, HOLEN Are
- Journal article citation:
- Aging and Mental Health, 15(3), April 2011, pp.318-326.
- Publisher:
- Taylor and Francis
The aim of this study was to investigate the interplay between personality, mental health and type of disease in explaining caring burden of caregivers of partners with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) or dementia. A cross-sectional study included 206 participants, 105 cohabitants of partners with COPD and 101 cohabitants of partners with dementia. Neuroticism was assessed by Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) and externality by Locus of Control of Behaviour. The Relative Stress Scale evaluated caring burden. Mental health was determined by the General Health Quality (GHQ-28) questionnaire. The results found that neuroticism and type of illness played a major role in explaining caring burden and mental health. Many of the carers were above the cut-off point for psychiatric caseness on the GHQ; 30.5% for the COPD group, and 58.4% for the dementia group. Both groups had low scores for depression and high scores for social dysfunction, anxiety, insomnia and somatisation. Compared to the dementia group, the COPD group had lower scores and fairly stable levels on all subscales of the GHQ. Females had higher scores on somatic symptoms, anxiety and insomnia; they also reported higher scores on neuroticism and externality. The article concludes that differences in personality and illness explained both caring burden and mental health among caregivers.