Cognitive Appraisal and Adjustment to Infertility

We examine adults' cognitive appraisals of their infertility and how these appraisals relate to each other and to psychological adjustment. In two samples, 76 women and 54 men rated their appraisals of threat, challenge, and control connected with infertility and completed measures of global and infertility-specific distress. Couples appraised their infertility as both harmful and beneficial, and as relatively uncontrollable. Partners did not differ in their appraisals or global distress, although wives reported more infertility-specific distress than their husbands. Women who were more threatened by their infertility were more distressed, as were those who felt less challenged and those who perceived less control over infertility outcomes. Males' appraisals were unrelated to distress, although men whose wives were more challenged by their impaired fertility were less distressed than their counterparts.