The Chinese authors (Chung S.K., 2007, personal communication,
Hu H.L., 2007, personal communication, Lu J.R.,
2007, personal communication) of the three instruments
believe that, theoretically, combining the subscales into one
index is feasible, and we therefore collapsed problem-focused
and emotion-focused coping behaviours into a coping index
(Cronbach’s alpha = 0Æ84), state and trait anxiety into an
anxiety index (Cronbach’s alpha = 0Æ96), and physical and
mental dimensions into a quality of life index (Cronbach’s
alpha = 0Æ83). Additionally, the subscales of each instrument
were collapsed into one index to better detect the effects of
demographic variables on these dependent variables.