COPING WITH LIFE-SPAN CRISES IN A GROUP AT RISK OF MENTAL AND BEHAVIORAL-DISORDERS - FROM THE LUNDBY STUDY

The subjects belong to a prospective, longitudinal population study on mental health, the Lundby study, performed in 1947, 1957 and 1972. In 1988-1989, 148 individuals, then 42-56 years of age, raised in famili es with at least 3 risk factors for mental or behavioral disorders, we re interviewed about their life span coping style. Twenty-two coping m echanisms were rated; optimism, substitution, wishful thinking, proble m-solving, planning, self-reliance, humor, acceptance, resignation, so cial support, comparison with others, religion, catharsis, self-critic ism, value reinforcement, alcohol and drug consumption, professional h elp, endurance, information-seeking, isolating activity, magic and min imizing. Together they contributed statistically significantly to ment al health (explained variance 24%) and quality of life (explained vari ance 28%). Problem-solving, social support and optimism were frequentl y used and were statistically associated with positive mental health a nd lower frequencies of some mental disorders. Sense of coherence, a p ersonal disposition factor, was also statistically associated (explain ed variance 22%) with the combined coping mechanisms.