Table 2.
Comparisons of personality traits, psychosocial functioning and marital adjustment of couples with and without a partner with bipolar disorder
| Couples | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| One partner with BD | Two healthy control partners | |||
| M (SD) | M (SD) | F | η2 | |
| Personality (NEO-PI-R)a | n = 58 | n = 47 | ||
| Neuroticism | 55.37 (7.43) | 44.94 (7.35) | 35.86** | .26 |
| Extraversion | 47.88 (6.45) | 52.10 (5.56) | 7.80** | .07 |
| Openness | 49.68 (7.70) | 52.10 (6.46) | .13 | .00 |
| Agreeableness | 50.11 (6.81) | 52.16 (5.71) | .51 | .01 |
| Conscientiousness | 47.12 (7.73) | 51.06 (5.45) | 6.21* | .06 |
| Negative life events (LES)b | n = 48 | n = 33 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dependent | 2.55 (1.47) | 1.32 (1.17) | 13.17** | .14 |
| Independent | .40 (.48) | .35 (.40) | .61 | .01 |
| Coping skills (CISS)c | n = 57 | n = 47 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Task-oriented | 46.93 (7.43) | 51.60 (7.20) | 5.51* | .05 |
| Emotion-focused | 52.56 (7.13) | 46.19 (6.08) | 13.41** | .12 |
| Avoidance-oriented | 51.33 (8.15) | 45.38 (7.60) | 14.20** | .12 |
| Social support (ASSI)d | n = 58 | n = 47 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Size of social network | 10.16 (5.72) | 17.20 (9.22) | 12.52** | .11 |
| Satisfaction with social network | 25.75 (2.89) | 28.27 (1.85) | 21.07** | .17 |
| Amount of social contact | 7.00 (6.02) | 12.45 (8.10) | 8.73** | .08 |
| Satisfaction with social contact | 4.19 (.76) | 4.70 (.50) | 10.33** | .09 |
| Marital adjustment (DAS)e | n = 45 | n = 46 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Consensus | 50.39 (6.72) | 53.52 (5.44) | 6.51* | .07 |
| Affectional expression | 8.08 (2.41) | 9.23 (1.95) | 6.65* | .07 |
| Satisfaction | 34.07 (7.80) | 39.72 (4.22) | 15.83** | .15 |
| Cohesion | 14.04 (4.89) | 16.15 (3.32) | 5.25* | .06 |
| Verbal aggression (CTS)f | n = 45 | n = 45 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Inter-partner | 18.45 (19.47) | 9.44 (9.34) | 3.46 | .04 |
Due to non-independence of data and to obtain a global estimate of couple functioning, mean scores across all available parents. when there was more than one parent in a family were used (number of single-parent families = 11 (7 BD))
T-scores were used for the Personality and Coping Skills subcategories, *p < .05, **p < .01
BD: bipolar disorder
aFrom the NEO Personality Inventory-Revised
bFrom the Life Events Scale
cFrom the Coping Inventory of Stressful Situations
dFrom the Arizona Social Support Interview
eFrom the Dyadic Adjustment Scale
fFrom the Conflict Tactic Scale