The impact of coping and emotional intelligence on the relationship between posttraumatic stress disorder from past trauma, adjustment difficulty, and psychological distress following divorce

Posttraumatic Growth and Subjective Well-Being in Men and Women after Divorce: The Mediating and Moderating Roles of Self-Esteem

Prior research has mainly examined non-adaptive responses to divorce, with less attention being paid to positive changes following the adversity of marital dissolution, especially posttraumatic growth and its consequences. The aim of this paper was to analyse the relationship between posttraumatic growth and subjective well-being, as well as the mediating and moderating role of self-esteem in this relationship among divorced men and women. The sample consisted of 209 divorcees (143 females, 66 males) aged 23-80 (M = 41.97, SD = 10.72). The Posttraumatic Growth Inventory (PTGI), the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire (OHQ) and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (SES) were used in the study. Positive associations between overall posttraumatic growth, specific growth dimensions, subjective well-being and self-esteem were found. Self-esteem was confirmed as a mediator in the relationships between changes in perception of self and subjective well-being (SWB), between changes in relating to others and SWB and between appreciation for life and SWB. Self-esteem moderated the association between spiritual changes and subjective well-being; namely, changes in spirituality were positively related to happiness in individuals with lower and average self-esteem but not with high self-esteem. We found no differences between women and men in the obtained results. Self-esteem might be considered a possible psychological (mediating rather than moderating) mechanism in the transmission of PTG onto SWB in divorcees, regardless of their gender.

Coping skills and glycaemic control: the mediating role of diabetes distress

AIMS

The present study examined the mediating role of diabetes distress on the relationship between coping and glycaemic control, and evaluated if the afore-mentioned mediation was moderated by insulin treatment in people with type 2 diabetes.

METHODS

A total of 473 adults with type 2 diabetes were recruited from an outpatient clinic in Hong Kong and invited to take part in a survey that measured adaptive coping, maladaptive coping, and diabetes stress. Glycaemic control was measured by glycated haemoglobin values extracted from medical records. PROCESS v3.4 macro was used to test the moderated mediation model.

RESULTS

Adaptive coping was negatively associated with diabetes distress (-0.29, 95% CI: -0.53, -0.06), whereas maladaptive coping was positively associated with diabetes distress (1.82, 95% CI: 1.12, 2.51). Diabetes distress had a positive relationship with glycated haemoglobin (0.04, 95% CI: 0.02, 0.05), but no correlations were found between glycated haemoglobin and adaptive coping or maladaptive coping. Insulin treatment not only weakened the diabetes distress-glycaemic control relationship (-0.04, 95% CI: -0.06, -0.01), but also weakened the mediation effect of maladaptive coping-glycaemic control relationship via diabetes distress (-0.07, 95% CI: -0.12, -0.02).

CONCLUSIONS

The study findings revealed the role of diabetes distress and insulin treatment in the link between coping skills and glycaemic control. Interventions to help boost confidence and autonomy in people with diabetes could help them lessen diabetes distress.

Emotional intelligence as a moderator between perfectionism and happiness

Happiness plays a key role in influencing adolescent performance in a variety of contexts. The present study was designed to investigate the relationships between perfectionism, emotional intelligence, and happiness and to test the moderating role of emotional intelligence in the relationship between perfectionism and happiness among Malaysian adolescents. The participants were 412 Malaysian high-school students from Selangor, all of whom completed self-report questionnaires. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to examine whether students with high levels of personal standards perfectionism, low levels of evaluative concerns perfectionism, and high levels of emotional intelligence reported higher levels of happiness. Multigroup analyses showed that emotional intelligence emerged as a significant moderator in the link between evaluative concerns perfectionism and happiness. These findings highlight the importance of emotional intelligence in mitigating the devastating effects of evaluative concerns perfectionism on happiness.