本研究主要目的在了解未領取照顧酬勞之女性非正式照顧者，因照顧生病家屬或親友所產生的旅遊阻礙及其負面情緒之調適狀況。照顧者在從事常態性的照顧工作時，會對其照顧之狀態進行自我評價；其照顧過程中易產生各種情緒反應；為調節負向情緒，個人可能採取之策略亦不同；又照顧者可能因照顧而減少或無法旅遊，進而產生實質、社會與情感阻礙。然過往文獻較未試圖針對該母體對象，探討上述變項間之關係，故本研究針對正在照顧親朋病患之女性，以便利抽樣進行問卷調查。已發放之230份問卷中含有效問卷215份，有效回收率為93.5%。本研究分別採用區別分析與變異數分析來驗證，研究結果得知，照顧者的評價越偏向負面，其負面情緒越強；照顧者的負面情緒強弱程度不同，在情緒調適上具顯著差異，這些調適包括了一般的、認知上的與行為上的，而負面情緒較弱的照顧者所做的三種調適方法皆較負面情緒較強的照顧者多；而照顧者之負面情緒越強，其感受到的旅遊阻礙也越嚴重，尤以情感阻礙的部份具顯著差異。本研究結果驗證了女性非正式照顧者照顧者評價、負面情緒、旅遊阻礙與負面情緒調適間之部分關係，可提供後續相關研究作為參考。
The purpose of this study was to understand the informal female caregivers’ travel constraints, and their negative mood regulation in taking care of the patients who are their families, relatives or friends. The caregiver appraisal could be used to evaluate the caregivers’ situation or feelings of caring for their patients. The caregivers would have various emotion responses to their care situation, and different strategies for regulating their negative mood would be employed. Moreover, when the caregivers care for their patients, they may reduce their travel time or give it up. The travel constraints they may have are physical, social, and emotional. However, little attempt has been made to explore the relationships among the abovementioned variables for this special population. Therefore, a convenience sample of the informal female caregivers was chosen for the questionnaire survey. Two hundred and thirty respondents were interviewed and two hundred and fifteen questionnaires were available for further analysis. The valid response rate was 93.5%. Discriminate analysis and one-way ANOVA were used to test the distinctions of each other. It was found that the caregivers whose appraisal was less positive had stronger negative moods. The caregivers with different level of negative moods would choose significantly different strategies for negative mood regulation. These regulations included general, cognitive and behavioural items. The caregivers who had none or minimal depress applied more regulation strategies than these who had severe depress. Furthermore, the stronger the caregivers’ negative moods were, the higher level of travel constraints they would feel, and there were significant differences between negative moods and emotional constraints. The study has verified a part of the relationship between caregiver appraisal, travel constraints and negative mood regulation. The results could be applied further in other research.
