Health Psychology最新文献

Approximately one in five Black women report experiencing pain during their last sexual encounter (Townes et al., 2019). Although Black women experience dyspareunia more frequently and intensely than their White counterparts, they are less likely to receive a proper diagnosis and treatment (Carter et al., 2019). Despite advancements in genito-pelvic pain/penetration disorder (GPPPD) research, the continued omission of Black women and the failure to consider their lived experiences perpetuate the exclusion of Black women's pain experiences and exacerbate inequities in vulvar pain research. Using an intersectional and Black feminist approach, this socioecological conceptual article explores the sociohistorical, sociostructural, sociocultural, and interpersonal factors that uniquely place Black women at risk of experiencing vulvar pain, developing GPPPD, ignoring their GPPPD symptoms, and receiving misdiagnoses. Theoretical frameworks, methodologies, and interventions that should be implemented in future research with Black women experiencing GPPPD symptoms are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objective: This study aimed to describe the child- and parent-centered lived experience of chronic sickle cell pain and its management among children and adolescents living with sickle cell disease (SCD). A secondary aim was to examine culturally relevant treatment preferences to inform clinically meaningful end points for nonpharmacological behavioral treatments and identify facilitators and barriers to behavioral treatments to enhance the feasibility and acceptability of future chronic sickle cell pain treatment programs.

Method: Participants were 14 dyads of children and adolescents with SCD and their parents. A qualitative, participatory approach was used to conduct individual semistructured interviews with iterative refinement of the interview guide, coding, and analysis throughout.

Results: Child and parent experiences described three overarching themes: (a) the experience of chronic sickle cell pain and its management, including the negative impact and increased stress from frequent school absences, hospitalizations, peer socialization, and changes in autonomy with age; (b) the impact on parent and family functioning, including parenting stress, needing community support, protecting each other from impacts of pain, and parents feeling guilt for the genetics of SCD; and (c) preferences for treatment and interventions, including expertise and trust in treating providers and skill acquisition to support living a full, valued life.

Conclusions: Children with chronic SCD pain and their caregivers conceptualize children's pain experiences as complex, dynamic, and shaped by the surrounding context. Adapting interventions to address the unique individual and family experiences and needs may enhance behavioral pain interventions, treatment engagement, and optimize the health of children with chronic SCD pain. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objective: Although racial and ethnic pain disparities are well-documented, fewer studies have examined rural and socioeconomic disparities or investigated how identities might intersect to predict pain outcomes. Moreover, little research has explored the protective role resilience may play in mitigating disparities. Guided by Booker's Hierarchy of Health Disparities Research framework, this study aimed to (a) investigate intersectional racial, ethnic, rural, and socioeconomic pain disparities and (b) examine the role of resilience in reducing pain disparities.

Method: We sampled a diverse group of 498 Veterans with osteoarthritis who were scheduled for total knee arthroplasty and were enrolled in a randomized controlled trial. Participants completed a battery of validated instruments to assess demographics, pain outcomes, and resilience (pain acceptance, values-aligned behaviors).

Results: Participants were primarily older adult males from diverse backgrounds (25% Black; 8% Hispanic; 26% rural; 70% >50th national percentile for socioeconomic disadvantage). Only race was significantly associated with pain outcomes across intersectional groups. There was no evidence of rural pain disparities. Socioeconomic status moderated the relationship between race, physical functioning, and psychological distress, such that racial disparities decreased as socioeconomic disadvantage increased. No other significant socioeconomic disparities emerged. Resilience did not moderate the relationship between race and pain. Rather, resilience was associated with better pain outcomes across racial groups.

Conclusions: Findings highlight the robust connection between race and pain. They also suggest that socioeconomic and rural and pain disparities may be less prevalent in Veterans. Resilience may be a modifiable factor that can improve pain outcomes in Black patients. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objective: Research suggests that high life satisfaction is related to better health outcomes, but its relationship with blood pressure, a key indicator of cardiovascular health, remains inconclusive. We conducted a comprehensive cross-sectional investigation of the association between life satisfaction and blood pressure.

Method: We analyzed data from 16 cohorts, each including life satisfaction assessments and blood pressure measurements. We meta-analyzed associations between life satisfaction and (a) continuous levels of systolic and diastolic blood pressure and (b) presence of high blood pressure, inferred based on measured blood pressure of ≥140/90 mmHg and self-reported medication use. We also conducted parallel analyses, predicting hypertension status operationalized based solely on self-reported diagnosis and medication use, as in previous research. Finally, we examined the role of depressive symptoms in these relationships.

Results: Meta-analytic results revealed no consistent association between life satisfaction and either measured blood pressure levels or the presence of high blood pressure. These associations did not differ by the type of life satisfaction measure used or by the economic conditions of the studied countries. However, when considering self-reported hypertension, higher life satisfaction was related to a lower hypertension risk, consistent with previous findings. More depressive symptoms were related to both lower measured blood pressure and a higher risk of self-reported hypertension.

Conclusion: These findings highlight the importance of distinguishing between self-reported and objectively measured health outcomes when understanding and investigating the relationship between psychological and physical well-being. We discuss caveats in relying on single-day blood pressure assessments or recalled diagnoses to infer hypertension status. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

ER diversity and global ER ability significantly moderated the prospective association between stress and interleukin-6Objective: Identifying psychosocial factors that promote health in the context of stress and aging is needed. Emotion regulation (ER) may be one such protective factor. The current study tested three forms of ER-use of individual ER strategies, diversity of ER strategies, and global ER ability-as moderators of the prospective association between perceived stress and inflammation in older adults.

Method: Adults (N = 162) aged 60+ completed baseline measures of perceived stress, ER strategies (situation selection, situation modification, reappraisal, and emotional acceptance) tested individually, and combined into an ER diversity metric, and a measure of global ER ability. Inflammatory markers (C-reactive protein, interleukin-6, and tumor necrosis factor-α) were assessed at baseline and follow-up (average 6.8 months later). Residualized change models tested ER measures as moderators of the association between stress and inflammation, adjusting for baseline inflammation and demographic and health covariates. Analyses were corrected for testing multiple inflammatory outcomes per form of ER.

Results: No one ER strategy moderated the prospective association between stress and inflammation (ps > .48). ER diversity and global ER ability significantly moderated the prospective association between stress and interleukin-6 (B = -.13, p_adjusted = .047) and C-reactive protein (B = .14, p_adjusted = .019), respectively. Higher ER diversity and lower deficit in global ER ability were protective and attenuated stress-inflammation associations.

Conclusions: Older adults experiencing higher stress who employ a diversity of ER strategies and have higher global ER ability had lower levels of interleukin-6 and C-reactive protein, respectively, but not of other markers. Initial results suggest ER approaches other than individual strategies may promote healthy immune aging in the context of stress. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objective: To compare the preliminary efficacy and acceptability of three narrative communication messages about human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination to a fact-based informational control message among parents with an unvaccinated child.

Method: A national sample of 948 U.S. parents/guardians with an unvaccinated child aged 9-17 years participated in an online experiment in June or July of 2023. Forty-nine percent of children were female, 23% were a racial or ethnic minority, and 55% received free school lunch. Parents were randomly assigned to watch one of four brief videos: a nonnarrative informational control, a role model only narrative, a precancer survivor narrative, or a cancer survivor narrative. The primary outcome variable was HPV vaccination intentions. The secondary outcomes were message acceptance and rejection. Covariates and a potential mediator were also assessed. Intervention effects were assessed using analysis of variance, hierarchical linear regression, and mediation analyses.

Results: Parents were satisfied with all four messages, as indicated by high levels of message acceptance and low levels of message rejection. Higher intentions to vaccinate were observed for parents exposed to the HPV cancer survivor narrative message (vs. the control message) and the effect remained statistically significant after controlling for covariates including child age, free lunch status (a proxy for family income), parent gender, provider recommendation, and previous refusal of HPV vaccine. Exploratory mediation analyses indicated that the cancer survivor narrative effect was mediated by increases in emotional engagement with the message.

Conclusion: Cancer survivor narratives are a highly acceptable and potentially promising intervention strategy for increasing HPV vaccine uptake. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objective: Diabetes mellitus (DM) negatively impacts functioning and disability, particularly when comorbid with mental health diagnoses. Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) increases the risk of developing DM and may have a particularly deleterious impact on DM-related outcomes. This study aimed to determine the extent to which PTSD and DM comorbidity was associated with poorer functioning and greater disability relative to neither or single diagnoses in older adult veteran men and women.

Method: Data came from two large cross-sectional studies of Vietnam era veteran men (N = 5,367) and women (N = 4,102). Participants completed self-report measures of diagnosed physical health conditions, functioning, and disability. PTSD and other mental health conditions were assessed via a telephone-administered diagnostic interview, and military characteristics were gathered from service records.

Results: In sex-specific weighted linear regression analyses adjusted for relevant covariates, veterans with PTSD only, DM only, and PTSD + DM reported significantly worse mental and physical health functioning and greater disability compared with veterans with neither condition. PTSD + DM comorbidity was associated with worse outcomes than DM only and worse physical health functioning than PTSD only. The pattern of results was similar for men and women.

Conclusions: Older adult veterans with both PTSD and DM may experience worse health functioning and greater disability relative to veterans with neither or single diagnoses only. Although effects were small to medium, potential clinical implications include assessment of PTSD among veterans with DM and intervention efforts that address the effects of both conditions on health and well-being. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objective: A two-arm cluster randomized controlled trial evaluated the impact of Body Confident Athletes (BCA) on girls' (N = 568, 11-17 years) body image, sports enjoyment, and affect.

Method: Sports organizations were randomly allocated (1:1) into either an intervention (BCA; k = 29) or waitlist control condition (k = 33). Girls and coaches in the intervention condition completed three 60-min sessions over three consecutive weeks. Primary outcomes were the immediate and short-term changes in girls' body esteem, with secondary outcomes assessing changes in girls' body appreciation, self-objectification, attuned self-care, sports enjoyment, and affect.

Results: Girls in the BCA condition reported significant small improvements in body esteem, body appreciation, attuned self-care, self-objectification, and negative affect at postintervention, with several effects either maintained (attuned self-care at 1-month follow-up [T3], but not at 3-month follow-up [T4]) or reemerging at later follow-up points (body esteem and self-objectification at T4, but not at T3). Effects were not maintained for body appreciation or negative affect, nor did effects emerge for sports enjoyment or positive affect. Coaches were effective interventionists (i.e., 80% accuracy), with most girls comprehending key intervention messages (85.1%).

Conclusion: BCA is the first coach-led positive body image intervention designed for girls in sport. The findings of the current trial show that BCA is a scalable body image intervention accurately delivered by sport community members, resulting in immediate and short-term improvements in girls' body image. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objective: Life satisfaction has been linked to lower mortality risk, yet the extent to which this relationship varies across population subgroups remains poorly understood.

Method: We used a machine-learning-based causal survival forest to evaluate how the association between life satisfaction and all-cause mortality over an 8-year follow-up differed across individuals and to characterize those who appeared to benefit most from life satisfaction. We leveraged data from the Health and Retirement Study (N = 13,674), a national cohort study of U.S. adults aged 50 and older.

Results: On average, higher life satisfaction was linked to a 3.56-month increase in restricted mean survival time (95% confidence interval = [1.61, 5.52]). While we observed evidence of between-individual heterogeneity in this association, the estimated effect of life satisfaction appeared beneficial for most individuals in this study. Evidence of the protective effect of life satisfaction was more pronounced among those who identified as racial minorities and reported lower educational attainment, fewer economic resources, and poorer prebaseline health.

Conclusions: These findings indicate that population-level strategies to foster higher life satisfaction could improve the health of older adults on average, while decreasing existing disparities in longevity. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objective: Burn injuries are a leading cause of preventable childhood trauma that threatens family functioning and well-being. This study aimed to analyze changes over time in parental psychosocial adjustment and child's burn-related outcomes, specifically burn scar quality and health-related quality of life (HRQoL), as well as the mediating role of family functioning.

Method: Data were collected at four different assessment moments: during the hospital stay (T0), 1 month (T1), 3 months (T2), and 6 months (T3) postdischarge. Parental coping and distress symptoms (anxiety, depression, and traumatic stress), family functioning, the child's burn scar quality and HRQoL were assessed.

Results: A total of 100 parents and their preschool-aged children were included. The results showed significant changes in all variables. In general, parental distress symptoms decreased over time, parental coping significantly increased from T1 to T2, and family functioning significantly decreased at all assessment moments compared to T0. The child's burn scar quality and HRQoL improved over time. In addition, family functioning fully mediated the relationship between parental distress and burn scar quality. The results suggested the importance of family functioning in the relationship between parental psychosocial adjustment and the child's physical recovery.

Conclusion: Implementing an integrated care approach, including family-centered empowerment care and routine psychosocial screening for parents, is highly recommended. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).