The Effects of Somatic Disability or Progressive Illness on Psychological and Social Well-Being

Abstract

Two different studies are discussed. In the first, 67 subjects with neuromuscular diseases were interviewed to study their mental state and features of their personality as functions of disability. Female subjects had a higher aggression level than male subjects. Aggression in different forms seemed to function as a coping mechanism for the female disabled subjects whereas denial and withdrawal were more typical for the males. Due to unsolved crises, unstated fear of the future and/or death or forlornness and the poor ability to form positive social relationships, the subjects had limited psychological resources to cope with the extremely stressful situation caused by disability and progressive diseases. In the other study, two test groups were formed. One included subjects with a hitherto nonvisible disability (n = 29), the other consisted of persons whose disability had already become visible but who had used wheelchairs for only 2 years or less (n = 40). The aim was to study different ways in which subjects in these two groups experienced crisis and what kind of differences occurred in it. Subjects with visible disability went through the crisis significantly better than the subjects in the other group. Most of the subjects had known about their diseases for a long time and the disorder itself did not cause their crisis symptoms. These were created by limitations in mobility, and even more so by fear of other people's attitudes toward disability.