| Each year approximately 13,000 children under the age of 20-years are diagnosed with cancer in the U.S. (United States Cancer Statistics, 2005). Although survival rates for childhood cancer have increased substantially since the 1970s, approximately 2,200 children die from cancer each year, making the threat of death very real for children and their families (USCS, 2005). The diagnosis and treatment of childhood cancer present numerous challenges and sources of stress for children and their parents (Kupst & Bingen, 2006). Not only are these families faced with the fear and stress of a life-threatening illness, but the treatment itself can be extremely stressful. Treatment of childhood cancer involves painful medical procedures, unpredictable hospital stays, frequent medical visits, difficult side effects of medication, financial burden, and significant changes to daily living. These parents also report feeling that they need to be a primary source of emotional support for their child (e.g., Kars, Duijnstee, Pool, van Delden, & Grypdonck, 2008), and that they are in an "executive" role of processing, managing, and conveying information from medical professionals to their children (e.g., Young et al., 2003).;In this paper, several relevant areas of the literature are reviewed briefly, including psychological distress in parents of children with cancer, parents’ coping with the stress of their child’s cancer, general emotion processes, and parenting behaviors. This brief review provides the background for two studies that examined parents’ psychological distress and coping over time in relation to their child’s cancer and how those constructs related to emotion processing and parenting behaviors. |
