Table 3.

Differences in uncertainty in illness and social support according to demographic and illness-related characteristics. (N = 148)

Variable	Category	uncertainty in illness			social support
		Mean	SD	t or F (p- value)	Mean	SD	t or F (p-value)
Age (years)	Below 40	77.54	15.10	1.696	66.27	14.14	0.955
	40–49	78.62	15.70	(.174)	64.87	17.26	(.416)
	50–59	84.62	15.61		59.13	18.83
	60 and over	86.71	15.08		61.45	18.46
Marital status	Married	66.75	13.94	2.479	72.43	10.97	1.597
	Single	83.91	15.52	(.089)	62.63	17.07	(.206)
	Widowed or divorced	82.68	13.06		59.61	17.92
Education	Less than high school	86.87	13.87	4.048	62.73	17.19	−0.207
	University and higher	75.16	14.67	(< .001)	63.37	16.43	(.836)
Religion	No	82.08	14.98	−0.387	62.75	19.19	0.060
	Yes	83.28	15.45	(.699)	62.57	15.83	(.952)
Having a job	No	86.45	14.99	1.213	62.22	14.70	0.304
	Loss of job	84.22	12.31	(.301)	65.12	14.85	(.738)
	Yes	81.17	16.29		62.20	18.85
Satisfaction with economic status	Satisfaction a	72.38	15.57	3.760	66.56	13.88	5.151
	Average b	82.65	14.68	(.027)	64.94	15.80	(.007)
	Dissatisfaction c	89.10	15.95	a < c	54.07	20.39	b > c
Number of children	No or 1	81.00	20.06	0.408	62.19	20.02	0.056
	2	84.45	13.24	(.666)	62.49	16.89	(.945)
	3 and over	82.31	15.40		63.38	14.49
Smoking status	Current smoker	96.80	20.03	2.195	48.63	27.02	−1.540
	Non-smoker	81.77	14.70	(.030)	63.50	16.29	(.166)
Drinking status	Current drinker	84.95	16.30	1.301	63.78	18.00	0.591
	Non-drinker	81.03	14.30	(.196)	62.00	16.90	(.556)
Type of cancer	Breast cancer	82.71	15.94	−0.140	66.77	14.09	1.911
	Thyroid cancer	83.19	15.16	(.889)	60.89	17.97	(.058)
Stage of cancer	Early-stage cancer	82.76	14.26	−0.490	64.13	13.66	0.241
	Advanced stage cancer	84.28	16.28	(.625)	63.43	18.44	(.810)
Time since completion of cancer treatment (years)	Less than 1	81.95	15.41	1.033	63.45	15.86	4.292
	1–5	87.13	14.02	(.360)	65.00	15.40	(.015)
	5 or more	82.22	17.36		49.25	25.56	a, b > c

Note. SD Standard Deviation

Post-Hoc test: Tukey’s test