Abstract
Health-related research suggests the belief in a just world can act as a personal resource that protects against the adverse effects of pain and illness. However, currently, little is known about how this belief, particularly in relation to one’s own life, might influence pain. Consistent with the suggestions of previous research, the present study undertook a secondary data analysis to investigate pain catastrophizing as a mediator of the relationship between the personal just world belief and chronic pain outcomes in a sample of chronic pain support group attendees. Partially supporting the hypotheses, catastrophizing was negatively correlated with the personal just world belief and mediated the relationship between this belief and pain and disability, but not distress. Suggestions for future research and intervention development are made.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 23–30 |
| Number of pages | 8 |
| Journal | Psychological Injury and Law |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| Early online date | 14 Jan 2016 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Mar 2016 |
Keywords
- Catastrophizing
- Chronic pain
- Disability
- Distress
- Personal belief in a just world
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Psychiatry and Mental health
- Law
Documents and Links
- McParland, J. & Knussen, C. (2016) Psychological Injury and Law article
© The Author(s) 2016 Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.