Coping, optimism, and general self-efficacy as predictors of psychophysical health

Abstract

The main objective of this research was to examine the contributions of coping mechanisms, optimism, and general self-efficacy in predicting the scores on the Psychophysical Health Scale. The same combination of predictor variables was used in prediction of particular aspects of psychophysical health related to physical health, fear and anxiety, depressive reactions, tiredness, and social behavior. In order to measure these constructs, the following instruments were used: the Psychophysical Health Scale, the Life Orientation Test-Revised for measuring dispositional optimism, General Self-Efficacy Scale, and Brief COPE for analyzing coping mechanisms. The research was carried out on a sample of convenience consisting of 269 students from the University of Novi Sad. Both undergraduate and graduate/master students were included. The factor structure analysis of the Brief COPE identified three factors included in the set of predictors: seeking social support, problem-focused coping strategy and avoidance-focused coping strategy. Significant predictors of the overall psychophysical health were: Avoidance-focused coping strategy (β = .24, p < .01), optimism (β = -.35, p < .01) and general self-efficacy (β = -.18, p < .05). The same combination of predictors proved to be significant in explaining every particular aspect of psychophysical health. Comparisons of individual contributions of predictors suggested that the variability in each particular aspect of psychophysical health could be explained by differences in the degree of optimism and susceptibility to avoidance-focused coping strategy.