Adaptación Psicológica en Personas Cuidadoras de Familiares Dependientes Psychological Adaptation in Caregivers of Dependent Re latives

Caring for a dependent relative is a stressful situation that can put the psycholog - ical health of the caregiver at risk, and which requires a level of psychological adaptation. We aimed to investigate whether adaptation to the caregiving situation can imply the exis - tence of differential personality styles, independently of the specific characteristics of the care situation; and, secondly, if the differences in psychological health among caregivers are related to specific profiles of personality. This study involved 105 caregivers (average of age = 56.06, SD = 15.97) of dependent relatives, mainly elderly people, who completed Millon's Inventory of Personality Styles and the GHQ-12. Altogether, the results show the existence of preferred psychological styles in this group of caregivers (Other-Nurturing, Realistic/Sensing, Feeling-Guided, Submissive/Yielding and Cooperative/Agreeing). The caregivers with worse mental health scored lower in the Pleasure-Enhancing, Externally Focused, Gregarious-Outgoing, Confident-Asserting and Dominant-Controlling scales, and higher in Pain-Avoiding, Internally Focused, Asocial-Withdrawing and Anxious-Hesitating.