Marital Adaptation and Interaction of Couples After a Mastectomy

Abstract

This study explored the marital adjustment and interactional patterns of married couples two to three years after the wife had undergone a single mastectomy for Stage I or I1 breast cancer. The subjects consisted of 14 couples who completed inventories measuring individual and marital adjustment. Videotapes of standardized interviews were rated for patterns of interaction. Neither husbands nor wives were found to be psychologically symptomatic, and both had adapted well to the wife's illness. Measures of marital adaptation, however, showed significant differences from norms on cohesion and consensus, with marked patterns of enmeshment and fluidity of adaptation. Such findings generally indicate serious marital pathology. Measures of individual adjustment and the clinical presentation of spouses did not support that conclusion, however. Instead, the authors suggest that the findings regarding marital adjustment indicate a normal reaction to life-threatening events rather than a pathological process. Furthermore, the standardization of psychological instruments on psychiatric populations may make the instruments dual measures when used with physically ill populations.