Self-blame attributions in women with newly diagnosed breast cancer: A prospective study of psychological adjustment

Associations between self-blame and anxiety and depression symptoms in a sa mple of 76 women with boast cancer were investigated. At diagnosis, behavio ral self-blame was associated with increased distress; at 3 months postdiag nosis, characterological self-blame was positively associated with affectiv e symptoms and behavioral self-blame approached significance (p =.07); and at 6 months, behavioral self-blame was related to increased distress. Prosp ective analyses revealed that characterological self-blame at diagnosis app roached significance in predicting distress at 3 months (p =.055) and was s ignificant in predicting distress at 6 months and at 1 year after diagnosis . These data indicate that behavioral self-blame is a correlate of concurre nt affective symptoms, whereas characterological self-blame predicts increa sed distress over time. Implications for social-cognitive processes in adap tation to boast cancer are discussed.