Abstract
Purpose
To examine whether adults with cancer view affective forecasting as important for treatment decisions, and to examine these perceptions among key subgroups.
Design
Adults with cancer (N = 376) completed a cross-sectional survey that included demographic and clinical characteristics, the IPIP five-factor personality measure, and a rating of the perceived importance of affective forecasting for cancer treatment decisions. Descriptive statistics characterized the importance of affective forecasting. Multivariate analyses examined whether health and personality variables were associated with affective forecasting importance.
Findings
Most participants (89.6%) identified affective forecasting as important for treatment decisions. Affective forecasting was more likely to be rated as important among patients with prostate cancer (p < .001), patients lower in neuroticism (p = .02), and patients higher in agreeableness (p = .004).
Conclusions/Implications: Patients believe it is important to understand how treatments will impact their emotional well-being. Oncology clinicians should discuss with patients these consequences during healthcare decision-making.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).