In recent decades, researchers and clinicians have sought to determine how to improve the quality of life (QOL) of women with breast cancer. Previous research has shown that many women have particular behavioral coping styles, which are important determinants of QOL. As behavior is closely associated with cognition, these patients may also have particular cognitive coping styles. However, the cognitive coping characteristics and their effects on QOL in women with breast cancer remain unclear. Thus, this study aimed to characterize cognitive coping styles among women with breast cancer and explore the effects of cognitive emotion regulation strategies on QOL. The Chinese version of the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire was used to assess cognitive coping strategies in 665 women newly diagnosed with breast cancer and 662 healthy women. QOL of patients was assessed using the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy for Breast Cancer Scale. Independent-samples t-tests were performed to investigate group differences in reporting of cognitive coping strategies. Multiple regression analyses were performed to examine the effects of cognitive coping strategies on QOL in patients after controlling for sociodemographic and medical variables. Compared with control subjects, patients reported less frequent use of self-blame, rumination, positive refocusing, refocusing on planning, positive reappraisal, and blaming others, and more frequent use of acceptance and catastrophizing (all p < 0.01). The three strongest predictors of group membership were catastrophizing (B = −0.35), acceptance (B = −0.29), and positive reappraisal (B = 0.23). All nine coping strategies were significantly correlated with QOL in patients (all p < 0.05). After controlling for sociodemographic and medical variables, self-blame, rumination, and catastrophizing negatively affected QOL (all p < 0.05), whereas acceptance and positive reappraisal had positive effects (all p < 0.01). Compared with healthy women, women newly diagnosed with breast cancer use catastrophizing and acceptance more frequently, and positive reappraisal, self-blame, rumination, positive refocusing, refocusing on planning, and blaming others less frequently. Catastrophizing, rumination, and self-blame may be not conducive to QOL of women with breast cancer and acceptance and positive reappraisal may be useful.

Studies in western countries have revealed that excessive sedentary behavior is a major risk factor for physical inactivity in adolescents. This study was performed to investigate the association between sedentary behavior and physical inactivity in Chinese adolescents using a large-scale cross-sectional survey design.

Patients with breast cancer usually present varying levels of depressive symptoms. Emotional suppression, as a coping style, refers to an individual’s ability to consciously control expression of negative emotions. Thus, emotional suppression is an important psychological factor related to depressive symptoms in patients with breast cancer. It has long been considered that compared to European and American women, Chinese women are more likely to ascribe to norms of negative emotion control for smooth social interaction. However, there is paucity of research focusing on emotional suppression among Chinese women with breast cancer. Thus the aims of the current study were (1) to investigate the incidence of depressive symptoms in women newly diagnosed with early breast cancer in Mainland China, and (2) to examine the relationships between emotional suppression and depressive symptoms in these patients. The Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES-D), the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) and the Chinese version of the Courtauld Emotional Control Scale (CECS) were used to assess the level of depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms and emotional suppression respectively in 247 women with early breast cancer and 362 healthy women. Analyses of variance were conducted to investigate group differences on depressive symptoms and emotional suppression. Bivariate correlations and Hierarchical regression analyses were performed to examine the effect of emotional suppression on depressive symptoms in participants after controlling the impact of group membership and anxiety level. (1) The incidence rates of clinical and severe depressive symptoms in patients were 36.4 and 36.0 % respectively. (2) Patients scored significantly higher than healthy women on CECS. (3) The scores on CECS were significantly associated with the total CES-D scores in all participants; Anger suppression significantly predicted the total CES-D scores. The majority of women newly diagnosed with early breast cancer reported clinical or severe depressive symptoms. As well, these patients presented a controlled emotion coping style. Emotional suppression was associated with the level of depressive symptoms in women newly diagnosed with breast cancer. Anger suppression might play a unique role in the depressive symptoms among women newly diagnosed with breast cancer.