A randomized controlled trial of emotionally expressive writing for women with metastatic breast cancer.

Health Psychol. 2010 Jul;29(4):460-6. doi: 10.1037/a0020153.

Low CA¹, Stanton AL, Bower JE, Gyllenhammer L.

 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3128513/

 

Objective

To test the effects of emotionally expressive writing in a randomized controlled trial of metastatic breast cancer patients and to determine whether effects of the intervention varied as a function of perceived social support or time since metastatic diagnosis.

Design

Women (N = 62) living with Stage IV breast cancer were randomly assigned to write about cancer-related emotions (EMO; n = 31) or the facts of their diagnosis and treatment (CTL; n = 31). Participants wrote at home for four 20-min sessions within a 3-week interval.

Main Outcome Measures

Depressive symptoms, cancer-related intrusive thoughts, somatic symptoms, and sleep quality at 3 months postintervention.

Results

No significant main effects of experimental condition were observed. A significant condition × social support interaction emerged on intrusive thoughts; EMO writing was associated with reduced intrusive thoughts for women reporting low emotional support (η² = .15). Significant condition × time since metastatic diagnosis interactions were also observed for somatic symptoms and sleep disturbances. Relative to CTL, EMO participants who were more recently diagnosed had fewer somatic symptoms (η² = .10), whereas EMO participants with longer diagnosis duration exhibited increases in sleep disturbances (η² = .09).

Conclusion

Although there was no main effect of expressive writing on health among the current metastatic breast cancer sample, expressive writing may be beneficial for a subset of metastatic patients (including women with low levels of emotional support or who have been recently diagnosed) and contraindicated for others (i.e., those who have been living with the diagnosis for years).

Expressive writing in women with advanced breast cancer.

Oncol Nurs Forum. 2007 Sep;34(5):1019-24.

Laccetti M¹.

To explore the relationships between patterns of affective word use (words with positive or negative connotations) in expressive writing conducted over four consecutive days and quality of life (QOL) three months after the writing exercise in women with metastatic breast cancer.

DESIGN:

Descriptive, correlational.

SETTING:

Six clinical sites in New England.

SAMPLE:

68 women with metastatic breast cancer.

MAIN RESEARCH VARIABLES:

Patterns of positive and negative affective word use and QOL.

METHODS:

Usage patterns of affective words in expressive writing were identified through the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC). Relationships between patterns of affective word use and QOL were explored. QOL was measured at baseline and three months after the writing exercise by the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-Breast. Correlations between patterns of word use and QOL were investigated using general linear regression.

FINDINGS:

A significant relationship was found between positive-affect word use and emotional well-being. Manual scoring of 10 expressive writing texts to validate LIWC data identified a significant difference between LIWC and manual counts for negative language. Contextual evaluation suggested marked ambivalence in how the women wrote about cancer.

CONCLUSIONS:

A positive relationship between affective language in disclosure and QOL was demonstrated, illustrating a cognitive process occurring in expressive writing.

IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING:

The findings suggest that expressive writing is a positive, helpful intervention for patients with cancer attempting to reintegrate the experience in life. Nurses should gain deeper understanding of underlying cognitive processes of disclosure to identify the most effective manner in which to use such interventions.

 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17878130