Coping and extreme response tendency in duodenal ulcer patients

In this study we examined problem- and emotion-focused coping in samples of 30 duodenal ulcer (DU) patients and 30 matched healthy controls. Coping processes were assessed for two stressful situations, viz, an interpersonal conflict and a difficult task or job. The results indicated that DU patients and controls did not differ in terms of preferred coping strategies: irrespective of type of stressor, no differences were found between the two samples, neither in terms of a more general inclination toward problem- or emotion-focused coping, nor in terms of separate, more fine-grained coping mechanisms. Furthermore, rating extremity was studied in both samples. It was found that DU patients have a tendency to endorse extreme positive responses ("Very characteristic of me") more often than controls. The latter finding is discussed in terms of competing explanations: (a) higher polarizing tendencies of DU patients vs. (b) higher meaningfulness of the questionnaire items for DU patients. Specific directions for future research are described.