Table 5.

Summary of factors associated with QoL in relatives of individuals with SMI

		Direction of association with QoL	Number of papers that include the factor
Individual factors	↑ Age	↑↓	6
	Gender: female	↓	2
	↑ Educational level	↑	3
	Employment status: being employed	↑	3
	Marital status: being single	↓	2
	↑ Personal resourcefulness	↑	1
	↑ Sense of coherence	↑	1
	↑ Physical health	↑	2
	↑ Knowledge about the illness	↑	1
Family factors	Kinship: parent	↓	6
	↑ Family income	↑	3
	Number of dependent members (≥ 2)	↓	1
	Living with the patient	↓	2
Characteristics of the patient with SMI	↑ Age	↑	1
	↑ Educational level	↑	1
	Employment status: being employed	↑	1
	Diagnosis: schizophrenia vs. depression	↑	1
	Better clinical status	↑	2
	↑ Number of hospitalisations	↓	1
	↑ Patient’s functioning	↑	2
Factors related to the disease process	Onset of the illness (≥ 45 years)	↑	1
	Being exposed to the patient’s illness (≥ 10 years)	↓	2
	↑ Illness perception	↓	1
	Perception of illness under their own control	↓	1
	↑ Objective burden	↓	3
	↑ Subjective burden	↓	4
	↑ Psychological distress	↓	1
	↑ Anxiety symptoms	↓	1
	↑ Depression symptoms	↓	4
	↑ Social readjustment	↓	1
	Poor health	↓	1
	↑ Family alienation	↓	1
Contextual factors	Country (Chilean vs. French)	↓	1
	↑ Social stigma	↓	2
	Attending Day care	↓	1
	↑ Social support	↑	2

↑ = positive association with QoL; ↓ = negative association with QoL