Affiliation:
1. Philosophy and Mental Health Unit, Department of Social Sciences and the Humanities, Poznań University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Wielkopolskie, Poland
2. Institute of Philosophy, Maria Curie-Sklodowska University Lublin, Lublin, Lubelskie, Poland
Abstract
Background
While it is well known that illnesses such as cancer modify the experience of time, the impact of the rhythm and length of treatment on patients’ time perspectives remains unknown.
Methods
A short version of Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory and Transcendental Future Perspective Questionnaire as well as a demographic questionnaire on a convenience sample of 259 patients (66.8% female, mean age 52.36) with various cancers and undergoing chemotherapy with different frequencies (1, 2, 3 weeks) and mean time in treatment 23.4 months.
Results
The temporal perspectives mean scores of cancer patients are: positive past 3.69, negative past 3.13, present hedonism 3.08, future 3.77, transcendental future 3.40. Patients tend only slightly to lose faith alongside the course of oncological treatment regardless of their age (ρ = − 0.210, p < 0.01). The frequency of chemotherapy mildly differentiates temporal perspectives of patients regarding present hedonism and transcendental future: a weekly treatment is more disturbing than the triweekly one and no treatment in terms of hedonism, while patients not in chemo score significantly higher in transcendental future than patients in biweekly and triweekly chemo.
Conclusions
The variations of treatment rhythm are less significant than predicted, although still relevant. Since most sociodemographic variables are of no relevance, cancer experience likely unifies temporal perspectives among people of different backgrounds.
Subject
General Agricultural and Biological Sciences,General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology,General Medicine,General Neuroscience
Cited by
4 articles.
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