Appraisals of controllability and coping in caregivers and HIV+ men: testing the goodness-of-fit hypothesis

The authors examined goodness of fit between controllability appraisals and coping in 82 HIV+ and 162 HIV-gay men experiencing the chronic stress of caregiving and 61 HIV+ gay men who were not caregiving. Multiple assessments of each individual over a 2-year period allowed replication of prior cross-sectional research examining goodness of fit, as well as the creation of intraindividual goodness-of-fit scores that were then used to examine within-person fluctuations in goodness of fit over time and goodness of fit as an individual difference variable related to adjustment. Results indicate that the importance of goodness of fit varies for different kinds of coping: The concept was supported for problem-focused coping and, to a lesser extent, for emotion-focused coping but not for meaning-focused coping. Within-subject variation in goodness of fit was related to within-subject variation in depressed mood, but between-subjects variation (individual differences) in fit was not associated with depressed mood, suggesting that goodness of fit is better understood as a transactional variable than as a personality or "coping style" variable.