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Does psychosocial stress exacerbate avoidant responses to cancer information in those who are afraid of cancer? A population-based survey among older adults in England

Vrinten, C; Boniface, D; Lo, SH; Kobayashi, LC; Von Wagner, C; Waller, J; (2018) Does psychosocial stress exacerbate avoidant responses to cancer information in those who are afraid of cancer? A population-based survey among older adults in England. Psychology & Health , 33 (1) pp. 117-129. 10.1080/08870446.2017.1314475. Green open access

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Abstract

OBJECTIVE: Communication of cancer information is an important element of cancer control, but cancer fear may lead to information avoidance, especially when coping is low. We examined the association between cancer fear and cancer information avoidance, and tested whether this was exacerbated by psychosocial stress. DESIGN: Cross-sectional survey of 1258 population-based adults (58-70 years) in England. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Cancer fear (intensity and frequency), perceived psychosocial stress and cancer information avoidance. Control variables were age, gender, ethnicity, marital status and education. RESULTS: A quarter (24%) of respondents avoided cancer information. Ordinal logistic regression analyses showed main effects of psychosocial stress (OR = 1.17, 95% CI 1.07-1.29) and cancer fear: cancer information avoidance was lowest in those with no cancer fear (13%), followed by those with moderate (24%; OR = 2.15, 95% CI: 1.49-3.12), and high cancer fear (35%; OR = 3.90, 95% CI: 2.65-5.73). In the adjusted model, the interaction between cancer fear and stress was significant (OR = 1.14, 95% CI 1.004-1.29, p < .05): 40% of those with high fear/high stress avoided cancer information compared with 29% with high fear/low stress. CONCLUSION: Cancer fear and psychosocial stress interact to produce disengagement with cancer-related information, highlighting the importance of affective processes to cancer control efforts.

Type: Article
Title: Does psychosocial stress exacerbate avoidant responses to cancer information in those who are afraid of cancer? A population-based survey among older adults in England
Location: England
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1080/08870446.2017.1314475
Publisher version: http://doi.org/10.1080/08870446.2017.1314475
Language: English
Additional information: Copyright © 2017 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons. org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Keywords: avoidance, cancer, fear, health communication, psychosocial stress, worry
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute of Epidemiology and Health
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute of Epidemiology and Health > Behavioural Science and Health
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute of Epidemiology and Health > Epidemiology and Public Health
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1549771
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