A survey study comparing young adults with MS and healthy controls on self-esteem, self-efficacy, mood and quality of life

•Typically people with MS report low levels of self-efficacy and self-esteem.•In MS high levels of anxiety and depression and reduced quality of life are common.•In this study young adults with MS did not differ from healthy controls on mood, perceptions of self and quality of life.•Advances in the field may have contributed to people with MS being more confident in facing the disease than in the past.

BackgroundStudies have shown that people with multiple sclerosis (MS) report low levels of self-efficacy and self-esteem, high levels of anxiety and depression and reduced quality of life. The study aims to assess self-esteem, self-efficacy, mood and quality of life in young adults with MS and to compare them to a healthy control group.MethodsThe age range for inclusion in the study was between 18 and 35 years of age for both groups. Subjects with MS were recruited through the Italian MS Society. Healthy controls were recruited through social media and from a university undergraduate program. Subjects completed an anonymous online questionnaire combining various scales. Group differences on demographic data were assessed using parametric and non-parametric tests. Analyses of covariance (ANCOVA) were performed to evaluate differences between the two groups on scales of self-perception, mood and quality of life, adjusting for potentially confounding factors.ResultsEighty-nine subjects with MS and 109 HC were included in the analysis. ANCOVA failed to demonstrate statistically significant differences between groups on self-esteem (F = 0.11, p = 0.743), self-efficacy (F = 2.22, p = 0.138), mood (anxiety F = 0.03, p = 0.855; depression F = 0.06, p = 0.812) and quality of life (F = 0.08, p = 0.772).ConclusionsThis study demonstrated that young adults with MS and healthy controls have similar levels of self-esteem and self-efficacy and that they do not differ significantly on measures of mood and quality of life, as previously reported.