Objective: This study aimed to examine the impact of dyadic coping on the quality of life of couples during pregnancy and to explore the potential mediating role of marital adjustment on this association. Background: According to the systemic transactional model, pregnancy can be characterised as a situation of dyadic stress because it affects both members of the couple. However, the impact of dyadic coping on couples’ quality of life during pregnancy is unexplored. Also, the potential mediating role of marital adjustment on this association remains understudied. Methods: Participants were 320 pregnant women and their partners (N = 640) who completed the Dyadic Coping Inventory, the Dyadic Adjustment Scale and the World Health Organisation Quality of Life instrument. Data were analysed using the actor–partner interdependence mediation model. Results: Results showed that there was an intrapersonal indirect effect of dyadic coping on quality of life through marital adjustment. Moreover, an interpersonal indirect effect was found with fathers’ dyadic coping being associated with mothers’ quality of life through mothers’ marital adjustment. Conclusions: These findings highlight the importance of assessing dyadic coping strategies of couples during pregnancy and targeting them in the psychological support offered to couples as a way of improving their marital adjustment, and consequently, their quality of life.

Perinatal research has focused essentially on maternal outcomes leaving paternal outcomes unexplored. This cross-sectional study aimed to explore the intrapersonal and interpersonal effects of mothers' and fathers' anxiety and depressive symptoms on their own and their partners' antenatal attachment to the fetus. Additionally, it aimed to explore the mediating role of dyadic adjustment on these associations. Participants, 320 pregnant women and their partners, completed the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, the Dyadic Adjustment Scale, and the Maternal and Paternal Antenatal Attachment Scale. Data were analyzed using the actor-partner interdependence mediation model. Mothers' (ß = -.16, p < .01) and fathers' depressive symptoms (ß = -.38, p < .001) were associated with their levels of antenatal attachment to the fetus. These relationships, however, were mediated by levels of dyadic adjustment (ß = -.08, p < .05; ß = -.09, p < .05, respectively). Fathers' anxiety symptoms were associated with their levels of antenatal attachment to the fetus (ß = .16, p < .05). This relationship was partially mediated by their levels of dyadic adjustment (ß = -.05, p < .05). Finally, fathers' depressive symptoms were associated with mothers' levels of antenatal attachment to the fetus through the mothers' dyadic adjustment levels (ß = -.06, p < .05). Results indicated that anxiety and depressive symptoms as well as lower levels of dyadic adjustment during pregnancy seem to negatively impact the levels of antenatal attachment to the fetus, especially for fathers. Results highlight the need to adopt a dyadic perspective to understand mothers' and fathers' outcomes during pregnancy. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

The current study examines whether the fear of being laughed at (gelotophobia) can be assessed reliably and validly by means of a self-report instrument in different countries of the world. All items of the GELOPH (Ruch and Titze, GELOPH〈46〉, University of Düsseldorf, 1998; Ruch and Proyer, Swiss Journal of Psychology 67:19–27, 2008b) were translated to the local language of the collaborator (42 languages in total). In total, 22,610 participants in 93 samples from 73 countries completed the GELOPH. Across all samples the reliability of the 15-item questionnaire was high (mean alpha of .85) and in all samples the scales appeared to be unidimensional. The endorsement rates for the items ranged from 1.31% through 80.00% to a single item. Variations in the mean scores of the items were more strongly related to the culture in a country and not to the language in which the data were collected. This was also supported by a multidimensional scaling analysis with standardized mean scores of the items from the GELOPH〈15〉. This analysis identified two dimensions that further helped explaining the data (i.e., insecure vs. intense avoidant-restrictive and low vs. high suspicious tendencies towards the laughter of others). Furthermore, multiple samples derived from one country tended to be (with a few exceptions) highly similar. The study shows that gelotophobia can be assessed reliably by means of a self-report instrument in cross-cultural research. This study enables further studies of the fear of being laughed at with regard to differences in the prevalence and putative causes of gelotophobia in comparisons to different cultures.

Caregiving is a complex occupation, with a significant impact for informal caregivers (IC). Stress-process models propose a framework that considers that this impact depends on primary and secondary stressors, but also on the IC situation appraisal. This work aimed to verify: whether being, or not, an IC of an individual with dementia influenced the relationship between family functioning and burnout; the association between neuropsychiatric symptoms of the individual with dementia and IC burnout and whether the IC burden and perceived family functioning had a mediating role in such relationship. This cross-sectional study investigated differences in family functioning and its association with burnout between IC and non-IC. For IC specifically, the study examined a mediation model to explore the possibility of neuropsychiatric symptoms indirectly affecting IC burnout through the impact on family functioning and burden. Measures included the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory, the McMaster Family Assessment Device, the Neuropsychiatric Inventory, and the Zarit Burden Interview. Results showed an association between poorer family function and high burnout, specifically in IC. They also showed that burden mediated the relationship between neuropsychiatric symptoms and burnout. The findings offer a significant contribution to the growing knowledge about the relationship between stressors associated with informal caregiving in dementia context, such as neuropsychiatric symptoms and its outcomes, like burnout.