Studies have shown that chronic illness patients encounter difficulties in the social sharing of emotions. Do HIV/AIDS patients present distinguishing traits in the inhibition of illness and non-illness-related emotions? The differences in the social sharing of emotion between 35 HIV/AIDS, 35 diabetic and 34 cancer outpatients were studied. A questionnaire assessed illness-related emotions, social sharing of emotion and emotional inhibition. The HIV/AIDS group significantly presented superior scoring in shame, guilt and non-sharing of illness-related emotions, lower frequencies of social sharing of emotion and less sharing partners. These findings could lead to future research examining the emotional expression of guilt and shame in HIV/AIDS.
Keywords: AIDS; HIV; cancer; emotions; social support; stigmatization.