Appraisal and ways of coping with daily hassles: relationships with optimism, perfectionism, alexithymia, and positive and negative affect

Abstract

The aim of the present work has been to asses to what extent the contents of the appraisal and the ways of coping with the hassles could be explained on the basis of four personality dimensions: positive and negative affect, optimism, perfectionism and alexithymia. Moreover, it has been tested to what extent the explicit ways of coping are influenced by a specific appraisal or, by contrast, are the personality dimensions the main source of influence. Our results showed that the personality dimensions had a powerful and reliable effect on the appraisal of the events and also on the specific ways of coping. The search for social support basically relies on the personality dimensions but slightly on the contents of the primary and secondary appraisal of the situation. The avoidance is highly influenced by these personality traits and just moderately by the appraisal of the events. Finally, the use of problem solving strategies depends on both types of variables.