The relationship of dispositional optimism, daily life stress, and domestic environment to two types of coping methods was examined in a group of 94 cancer patients. As expected, dispositional optimism and domestic environment made significant contributions to the prediction of avoidance coping. Dispositional optimism contributed significantly to the prediction of active-behavioral coping. Specifically, a significant positive relationship was obtained between active-behavioral coping and optimism. A significant positive relationship also was found between avoidance coping and both daily stress and domestic environment. Avoidance coping was negatively related to dispositional optimism. In multivariate analyses, gender and disease-related variables did not make significant contributions to the prediction of coping method. Suggestions for future research were made.

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Fifty-seven women with breast cancer completed measures of family adaptability and cohesion, marital adjustment, and psychosocial adjustment to illness. Using a circumplex model of family systems, we examined whether subjects who perceived their families at moderate levels of cohesion and adaptability reported better psychosocial adjustment than subjects from families with extreme levels of cohesion and adaptability. The results indicated that the patients who reported the best adjustment to breast cancer and in their marriages, also reported the highest levels of family cohesion. There was not a significant relationship between adjustment to illness and adaptability. The implications for the treatment of women with breast cancer and for the families of these patients were discussed.

Using a sample of 291 respondents from a teachers' union in a large urban district, this study tested a series of hypotheses concerning the relationships among job stress associated with teaching, stress-induced illness behavior, and social support by principals and co-workers. Illness increases as job stress increases, except that teachers assigned to schools where the principal is seen as supportive are significantly less likely to report stress-induced illness behavior than teachers in schools where the principal is seen as unsupportive. Supportive co-workers have no effect upon stress-induced illness behavior, nor is there a statistical interaction effect between principals and co-workers. Policy implications for reducing illness and absenteeism are noted.

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