Abstract
To assess the impact of a stressor, it is desirable to evaluate affected individuals' status both prior to and following a stressful event. Because of the difficulties inherent in prospective designs, investigators often ask people who have experienced an aversive event to evaluate their prestressor adjustment retrospectively. Do such retrospective evaluations provide a reasonable alternative to prospective assessment? To answer this question we compared retrospective and prospective data gathering procedures in the evaluation of sexual adjustment after prostate surgery. One hundred fifty-two married males who had undergone prostatectomy for benign prostatic enlargement completed a battery of measures which evaluated pre- and postsurgical sexual adjustment either prospectively (i.e., before and after surgery) or retrospectively (i.e., ratings made after surgery of both pre- and postsurgical adjustment). Retrospective assessment indicated considerable sexual deterioration pre- to postsurgery. In subjects tested prospectively, however, the results showed that surgery had little impact on sexual adjustment. Moreover, direct comparisons of retrospective and prospective methodologies reveal that discrepancies are due to differences in evaluations of presurgery status, with retrospective evaluation yielding more favorable ratings than prospective assessment. The results highlight a variety of biases which may affect self-ratings of pre- and post-stressor adaptation and show that discrepancies associated with the two methodologies have important implications for understanding the impact of a stressor on adjustment.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Basso, A. (1977). The prostate: The elderly male.Hosp Prac. 12(10): 117–123.
Bower, G. H. (1981). Mood and memory.Am. Psychol. 36: 129–148.
Campbell, D. T., and Stanley, J. C. (1966).Experimental and Quasiexperimental Designs for Research, Rand McNally, Chicago.
Clark, D. M., and Teasdale, J. D. (1982). Diurnal variation in clinical depression and accessibility of memories of positive and negative experiences.J. Abnorm. Psychol. 91: 87–95.
Cohen, B. D., Reynolds, B. S., Price, S., Schochet, B. V., and Anderson, A. J. (1980). Group treatment for erectile dysfunction in non-partnered males: New findings. Presentation at the American Psychological Association Annual Convention, Montreal.
Conway, M., and Ross, M. (1984). Getting what you want by revising what you had.J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 47: 738–748.
Creti, L., Fichten, C. S., Libman, E., and Brender, W. (1987). A global score for the “Sexual History Form” and its effectiveness. Presented at the 21st annual Association for Advancement of Behavior Therapy convention, Boston, Mass., Nov.
Fichten, C. S., Libman, E., and Rothenberg, I. (1988). Sexual Self-Efficacy Scale — Form E. In Yarber, W. L., and Davis, C. M. (eds.),Sexuality Related Measures: A Compendium, Graphic, Lake Mills, Iowa, pp. 129–131.
Fiske, S. T., and Taylor, S. E. (1984).Social Cognition, Random House, New York.
Frank, M. G., and Gilovich, T. (1989). Effect of memory perspective on retrospective causal attributions.J. Personal Soc. Psychol. 57(3): 399–403.
Greenwald, A. G. (1980). The totalitarian ego: Fabrication and revision of personal history.Am. Psychol. 35: 603–618.
Howard, G. S. (1982). Improving methodology via research of research methods.J. Counsel. Psychol. 29: 318–326.
Kaplan, H. S. (1974).The New Sex Therapy, Quadrangle, New York.
Kimmel, D., and Van der Veen, F. (1974). Factors of marital adjustment in Locke's marital adjustment test.J. Marriage Family, 29: 57–63.
Libman, E. (1989). Sociocultural and cognitive factors in aging and sexual expression: Conceptual and research issues.Can. Psychol. 30(3): 560–567.
Libman, E., and Fichten, C. S. (1987). Prostatectomy and sexual function: A review.Urology 29(5): 467–478.
Libman, E., Fichten, C. S., Brender, W., Burstein, R., Cohen, J., and Binik, Y. (1984). A comparison of three therapeutic formats in the treatment of secondary orgasmic dysfunction.J. Sex Marit. Ther. 10: 147–159.
Libman, E., Rothenberg, I., Fichten, C. S., and Amsel, R. (1985). The SSES-E: A measure of sexual self-efficacy in erectile functioning.J. Sex Marit. Ther. 11(4): 233–244.
Libman, E., Creti, L., and Fichten, C. S. (1987a). Determining what patients should know about transurethral prostatectomy.Patient Educ. Counsel. 9: 145–153.
Libman, E., Fichten, C. S., Brender, W. (with the collaboration of Creti, L., Weinstein, N., Rothenberg, P., Liederman, G., Jacobson, S., Elhilali, M. M., Aronson, S., and Taguchi, Y.) (1987b).Prostatectomy and Sexual Function in the Aging Male: Final report to the Conseil Québécois de la Recherche Sociale, Sir Mortimer B. Davis-Jewish General Hospital, Montreal.
Libman, E., Fichten, C. S., Creti, L., Weinstein, N., Amsel, R., and Brender, W. (1989). Transurethral prostatectomy: Differential effects of age category and presurgery sexual functioning on postprostatectomy sexual adjustment.J. Behav. Med. 12: 469–485.
Lobitz, W. C., and Baker, E. L., Jr. (1979). Group treatment of sexual dysfunction: Coping skill training for single males. In Upper, D., and Ross, S. M. (eds.),Group Treatment of Male Sexual Dysfunction: An Annual Review, Research Press, Champaign, Ill., pp. 99–115.
LoPiccolo, J., Heiman, J., Hogan, D. R., and Roberts, C. W. (1985). Effectiveness of single therapists versus cotherapy teams in sex therapy.J. Consult. Clin. Psychol. 53(3): 287–294.
McFarland, C., and Ross, M. (1987). The relation between current impressions and memories of self and dating partners.Personal. Soc. Psychol. Bull. 13: 228–238.
McFarland, C., Ross, M., and DeCourville, N. (1989). Women's theories of menstruation and biases in recall of menstrual symptoms.J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 57(3): 522–531.
Nowinski, J. K., and LoPiccolo, J. (1979). Assessing sexual behavior in couples.J. Sex Marit. Ther. 5: 225–243.
Orne, M. T. (1962). On the social psychology of the psychological experiment: With particular reference to demand characteristics and their implications.Am. Psychol. 17: 776–783.
Perry, D. C., Apostal, R. A., and Scott, T. B. (1988). Retrospective measures in the modification of attitudes toward persons with disabilities.J. Appl. Rehab. Counsel. 19: 24–27.
Riskind, J. H. (1983). Nonverbal expressions and the accessibility of life experience memories: A congruence hypothesis.Soc. Cognit. 2(1): 62–86.
Ross, M. (1989). The relation of implicit theories to the construction of personal histories.Psychol. Rev. 96: 341–357.
Snyder, C. R., and Higgins, R. L. (1988). Excuses: Their effective role in the negotiation of reality.Psychol. Bull. 104(1): 23–35.
Swann, W. B., Jr., and Read, S. J. (1981a). Acquiring self-knowledge: The search for feedback that fits.J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 41: 1119–1128.
Swann, W. B., Jr., and Read, S. J. (1981b). Self-verification processes: How we sustain our self-conceptions.J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 17: 351–371.
Takefman, J., and Brender, W. (1984). An analysis of the effectiveness of two components in the treatment of erectile dysfunction.Arch. Sex. Behav. 13(4): 321–340.
Taylor, S. E. (1983). Adjustment to threatening events; A theory of cognitive adaptation.Am. Psychol. Nov.: 1161–1173.
Taylor, S. E., and Brown, J. D. (1988). Illusion and well-being; A social psychological perspective on mental health.J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 103: 193–210.
Walsh, P. C., and Donker, P. J. (1982). Impotence following radical prostatectomy: Insight into etiology and prevention.J. Urol. 128: 492–497.
Widom, C. S. (1989). Does violence beget violence? A critical examination of the literature.Psychol. Bull. 106(1): 3–28.
Wixon, D. R., and Laird, J. D. (1976). Awareness and attitude change in the forced compliance paradigm: The importance of when.J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 34: 376–384.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
This research was funded by grants from the Conseil Québécois de la Recherche Sociale and from Fonds FCAR pour la Formation de Cherchevrs et al'Aide à la Recherche.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Fichten, C.S., Libman, E., Amsel, R. et al. Evaluation of the sexual consequences of surgery: Retrospective and prospective strategies. J Behav Med 14, 267–285 (1991). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00845455
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00845455