BEYOND GOOD AND BAD COPING - A MULTIDIMENSIONAL EXAMINATION OF COPINGWITH PAIN IN PERSONS WITH RHEUMATOID-ARTHRITIS

This article examines the utility of using a multidimensional instrume nt to assess pain coping in two samples of persons with rheumatoid art hritis (total N = 378). The predictive validity of the newly developed Vanderbilt Multidimensional Pain Coping Inventory (VMPCI), which asse sses eleven distinct coping strategies, was compared to that of the pr eviously validated Vanderbilt Pain Management Inventory (VPMI), which assesses the two broad dimensions of active and passive coping. In bot h samples, the VMPCI demonstrated reliable incremental validity over t he VPMI in predicting both positive and negative psychological adjustm ent, and the predictive ability of the VPMI was highly redundant with that of the VMPCI. Moreover using the VMPCI, both positive and negativ e adjustment were related to multiple coping strategies in ways that c ould not be revealed by the VPMI. These results offer considerable val idation to the VMPCI and illustrate the value of assessing coping mult idimensionally.