Tag: empathy

Brief report: The accuracy of parents for the thoughts and feelings of their adolescent suffering from chronic fatigue: a preliminary study of empathy

Abstract:

OBJECTIVE: This study examined the actual and estimated empathic accuracy (EA) of the parents of adolescents with chronic fatigue syndrome(CFS).

METHODS: The actual EA of both parents (n = 24) was assessed in relation to the thoughts and feelings of their child (n = 14) about CFS and about other life events. Adolescents were also asked to estimate the parents’ EA.

RESULTS: For the actual EA, both parents were significantly less accurate regarding the adolescent’s thoughts and feelings about CFS than about other life events. Fathers were just as empathically accurate as mothers. For the estimated EA, however, results indicated that adolescents perceived their mother to be more empathically accurate than their father. Actual EA and estimated EA about CFS were negatively correlated for fathers, not for mothers.

CONCLUSIONS: Results are discussed in terms of the importance of assessing EA in relation to other dimensions of empathic understanding and distress in the observer.

 

Source: Vervoort T, Crombez G, Buysse A, Goubert L, Backer TD, Ickes W. Brief report: The accuracy of parents for the thoughts and feelings of their adolescent suffering from chronic fatigue: a preliminary study of empathy. J Pediatr Psychol. 2007 May;32(4):494-9. Epub 2006 Sep 29. http://jpepsy.oxfordjournals.org/content/32/4/494.long (Full article)

 

Couples’ perceptions of wives’ CFS symptoms, symptom change, and impact on the marital relationship

Abstract:

The purpose of this descriptive correlational study was to describe the differences in couples’ perceptions of wives’ Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) symptoms and to describe the relationship between changing symptoms and the marital relationship.

The convenience sample of 131 wives with CFS and their spouses reported symptom changes similarly. However, wives reported significantly higher problem levels for constitutional, fatigue, cognition, central nervous system (CNS), musculoskeletal, and allergy symptom domains and significantly less problem levels of mood disturbance domain than their husbands.

Husbands who reported more symptom changes also reported lower marital adjustment, less empathy and support from their wives, and more conflict within the relationship. Wives who reported more symptom changes reported lower marital adjustment, less empathy for their husbands, and more conflict within the relationship and had husbands who reported lower marital adjustment and less empathy and support by the wives.

 

Source: Goodwin SS. Couples’ perceptions of wives’ CFS symptoms, symptom change, and impact on the marital relationship. Issues Ment Health Nurs. 2000 Jun;21(4):347-63. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11249354