Psychological Distress and Coping Mechanisms in Infertile Couples

Abstract

Numerous motivational and strong emotional intentions can be found in the background of the desire for a child. Hence unintended childlessness gives rise to a severe psychological burden to both members of the couple. In the literature, several studies are involved in the exploration of this subject, albeit most of them bring into focus the differences of psychological liabilities between the genders. A smaller proportion of these papers examined the psychological aspects affecting couples, and just a very small number of studies investigated the psychological aspects in men. Nevertheless, most of the studies proved that although the psychological aspects in women can be more significant compared to their partner, the psychological burden of infertile men are obviously above the population average. Several different, gender-specific coping-mechanisms have been identified, which tend to be less successful in men compared to women. The acquirement of proper coping mechanisms could be more emphasized during the psychotherapeutic part of reproductive treatment.

Mediating role of social support between sleep quality, anxiety and depressive symptoms in Chinese women undergoing in vitro fertilization treatment

“…4 Consequently, infertile women share common experiences, including anxiety and depression. 10 Patel and Sharma Kumar 11 indicated there are personal, situational, and treatment-related risk factors for infertility distress in terms of anxiety and depressive symptoms. Well-established research has suggested that anxiety and depressive symptoms in infertile women are associated with older age, marital relationship, 12 sleep disturbance, 8 and treatment-related factors, such as duration of infertility, medical side effects and failures related to IVF treatment.…”

Individual and Relational Well-Being at the Start of an ART Treatment: A Focus on Partners’ Gender Differences

“…Finally, both partners spent time on tasks related to family-building before starting treatment and, in this case also, gender differences in the amount of time spent on these tasks emerged ( Cusatis et al, 2019 ). Findings revealed that women’s mechanisms tended to be more successful – that is, were connected with lower levels of infertility-related psychological distress – compared to those of men ( Shapiro, 2009 ; Pásztor et al, 2018 ). Coping strategies can be considered another type of predictive factors of individuals’ adjustment to infertility and ART techniques ( Rockliff et al, 2014 ; Patel et al, 2018 ).…”

“…To face infertility and ART treatments, gender-specific coping strategies have been identified: specifically, women reported more emotion-focused coping strategies, while men preferred problem-focused coping strategies (Peterson et al, 2006). Moreover, women's typical coping mechanisms were seeking professional support and social support, and taking responsibility, while men's elective coping mechanisms were found to be distancing and self-control (Peterson et al, 2008;Pásztor et al, 2018). Finally, both partners spent time on tasks related to family-building before starting treatment and, in this case also, gender differences in the amount of time spent on these tasks emerged (Cusatis et al, 2019).…”

The effect of infertility on mental health in infertile women and men

“…Unfulfilling this multifactorial desire of having a child can impose serious psychological burden to the affected spouses [28]. Based on a review, that summarized the last twenty year's publications in this topic, studies related to infertility mostly discussed the aspects of psychological differences between genders, a smaller part of the researches focused on the aspect of psychological burden on couples, and only some research emphasized the emotional burden on males separately [21].…”

“…The main proportion of the literature focuses on the gender-differences of infertilityrelated mental health, especially focusing on women [21]. This attitude is understandable considering the psychological aspects of childlessness amongst men have been less evaluated compared to women in the past.…”