The central role of self-esteem in the quality of life of patients with mental disorders

• Published in: Scientific reports Vol. 12; no. 1; p. 7852
• Main Authors: Barbalat, Guillaume, Plasse, Julien, Gauthier, Emmanuel, Verdoux, Hélène, Quiles, Clélia, Dubreucq, Julien, Legros-Lafarge, Emilie, Jaafari, Nematollah, Massoubre, Catherine, Guillard-Bouhet, Nathalie, Haesebaert, Frédéric, Franck, Nicolas
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 12.05.2022; Nature Publishing Group; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 692/700/228; 692/700/784; Anxiety; Autonomy; Human health and pathology; Humanities and Social Sciences; Humans; Life Sciences; Mental disorders; Mental Disorders - psychology; multidisciplinary; Neural networks; Neurodevelopmental disorders; Patients; Psychiatrics and mental health; Quality of life; Quality of Life - psychology; Rehabilitation; Santé publique et épidémiologie; Schizophrenia; Schizophrenia - diagnosis; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Self Concept; Self esteem; Well being
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-11655-1

In psychiatry, recent years have seen a change of focus from a clinician- to a patient-centered perspective that emphasizes quality of life as a treatment target. As a complex construct, quality of life is composed of multiple dimensions that interact with one-another (e.g. physical and psychological well-being, relationships, autonomy, self-esteem). Here, we used data from the REHABase cohort, which includes N = 2180 patients from 15 psychosocial rehabilitation centers in France, to explore networks of quality-of-life dimensions among six psychiatric disorders: schizophrenia, neurodevelopmental, bipolar, depressive, anxiety, and personality disorders. Stronger connections (edges) involved the Self-Esteem dimension, such as Self-Esteem–Physical Well-Being, Self-Esteem–Autonomy, Self-Esteem–Psychological Well-Being, and Self-Esteem–Resilience. Self-esteem was also consistently retrieved as the most central node (the dimension with the most connections within each network). Between-group tests did not reveal any differences regarding network structure, overall connectivity, edge-weights, and nodes’ centrality. Despite presenting with different symptom profiles, various psychiatric disorders may demonstrate similar inter-relationships among quality-of-life dimensions. In particular, self-esteem may have a crucial inter-connecting role in patients’ quality of life. Our findings could support treatment programmes that specifically target self-esteem to improve patients’ quality of life in a cost-effective way.