Couples managing chronic illnesses-the leading causes of death and disability in the United States-can experience challenges in their daily lives and relationships. Both couple members have reported lower satisfaction, greater burden, and communication difficulties. Many of these illnesses are nonvisible or concealable, increasing fear and uncertainty when sharing illness information, and reducing self-disclosure. These challenges can leave couples vulnerable to dissatisfaction and distress. In this longitudinal study, we integrated dyadic coping frameworks to examine how couples' communication and coping predicted relational well-being over time. Couples, where one partner was diagnosed with a concealable chronic illness, completed three online surveys 6 months apart (n = 242 couples at baseline, 146 couples at 6 months, and 123 couples at 12 months). Couples were recruited from university settings. Actor-partner interdependence mediation models using within-person multilevel dyadic path modeling tested the theoretical model. For patient and partner actor effects, at times when they saw the illness as shared and something that they could manage together, the more they talked about the illness and used dyadic coping strategies (p < .001). In turn, when using dyadic coping strategies more often, patients and partners felt more satisfied, close, and sexually satisfied than they typically felt that year (p < .001). For cross-partner effects, when patients talked about the illness more than usual, their partners also used dyadic coping strategies more often (p = .01). Patients' open communication may not only benefit themselves but also their partners. This multifaceted approach offers new insight into promoting relational well-being while managing concealable chronic illness. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

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夫妻和隐匿性慢性疾病：调查夫妻随着时间的推移的沟通、应对和关系幸福感。

患有慢性疾病（美国死亡和残疾的主要原因）的夫妇可能会在日常生活和人际关系中遇到挑战。夫妻俩都表示满意度较低、负担较大、沟通困难。其中许多疾病是不可见或可隐藏的，增加了分享疾病信息时的恐惧和不确定性，并减少了自我披露。这些挑战可能会让夫妻容易感到不满和痛苦。在这项纵向研究中，我们整合了二元应对框架来研究夫妻的沟通和应对如何预测一段时间内的关系幸福感。其中一方被诊断患有隐匿性慢性病的夫妇，每隔 6 个月完成三项在线调查（n = 基线时 242 对夫妇，6 个月时 146 对夫妇，12 个月时 123 对夫妇）。夫妇是从大学环境中招募的。使用人内多级二元路径建模的参与者-合作伙伴相互依赖中介模型测试了理论模型。对于患者和合作伙伴的演员效应，有时当他们认为疾病是共同的并且是他们可以共同应对的事情时，他们更多地谈论疾病并使用二元应对策略（p < .001）。反过来，当更频繁地使用二元应对策略时，患者和伴侣会比当年通常的感觉更加满意、亲密和性满足 (p < .001)。对于跨伴侣效应，当患者比平时更多地谈论疾病时，他们的伴侣也更频繁地使用二元应对策略 (p = .01)。患者的开放式沟通不仅可以使自己受益，还可以使他们的伴侣受益。这种多方面的方法为促进关系福祉同时管理可隐藏的慢性疾病提供了新的见解。（PsycInfo 数据库记录 (c) 2023 APA，保留所有权利）。