MATERNAL COPING STRATEGIES IN RESPONSE TO A CHILD’S CHRONIC AND ONCOLOGICAL DISEASE. A CROSS-CULTURAL STUDY – ITALY & PORTUGAL

Background: A child’s chronic or oncological disease is a stressful condition for parents, that may affect the adaptive management helpful for warranting the child’s wellbeing to a disease. Particularly, this study focuses on the possible connections between the variable “culture” and parental strategies to cope with child’s severe disease, by a comparison between Italian and Portuguese mothers. Design and Methods: This research inquires differences and cross-cultural elements among the coping strategies used by Italian and Portuguese mothers of child with chronic or oncological disease. Participants are two mothers’ groups: 59 Italian mothers (M=37,7; SD=4,5) and 36 Portuguese mothers (M=3…