PSYCHOLOGY MASTER'S THESIS ABSTRACT

Helen A. Greaves
MA-Research
August 1998

Sense of Coherence and Preferred Coping Strategies

    Attempts to find personality traits that predict the choice of a coping strategy and the outcome of a stressful event have met with limited success.  Sense of Coherence (SOC) is the belief that life is meaningful, manageable, and comprehensible.  The current study explored SOC as a predictor of coping and health in an archive of data from a longitudinal study of the recently unemployed.  The present study augmented this archive by assessing the SOC in the original participants by means of mailing an additional questionnaire, which 75 of the original sample of 152 returned.  As hypothesized, it was found that: (a) strong SOC was associated with fewer stress-related physical and psychological symptoms; and (b) strong SOC participants relied on problem solving coping strategies, while weak SOC individuals favored avoidant strategies.  Strong SOC individuals were more likely to obtain reemployment within their chosen career.  Possible mechanisms behind the relationship were explored.

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