Illuminating Joy in Reproductive Endocrinology Patients Through Journaling

There must be further investigation into how the environment of patients undergoing treatments that can impact their emotional wellbeing can be improved. Especially with the prevalence of infertility impacting couples in the United States, examining how ameliorating the experience of undergoing treatments in Reproductive Endocrinology (RE) is essential. The common definition of joy in previous literature described this emotion as temporary, yet memorable and is impacted by one’s surroundings and social environment. There is yet to be research focusing on how illuminating joy for patients can impact their perception of the socio-emotional context they experience while receiving treatments. This study aims to investigate how journaling about joyful moments can ameliorate patients’ experiences while undergoing treatments in RE. In having RE patients journal about their experiences of joy and examining how they discuss their treatments, we answered the following research questions: In the context of their treatment, how do RE patients construct the concept of joy? Through interviews and structured journaling, how do they talk about joy? How do they link it with their treatment? Finally, when comparing patients who are engaging in structured journaling about their treatment, do any meaningful differences emerge? To answer these questions, RE patients were recruited through flyers passed out by a Reproductive Endocrinologist at an RE clinic. Participants recruited were divided into a treatment group (who journaled about joy) and a control group (who followed a structured journaling procedure) to discover emerging differences in the effect of journaling about joy. Participants were instructed to journal for 12 weeks, following a single and consistent prompt. Three interviews took place before, in the middle, and after the participants journaled to investigate their experience in journaling and ask about what was occurring in their treatments. Each time participants met for an interview, they were additionally instructed to complete questionnaires measuring mental health. A mixed-methods approach consisting of utilizing an Iterative Thematic Inquiry and performing a quantitative analysis with t-tests was necessary for analyzing the journal entries and interview transcripts as well as the mental health questionnaires. The analysis revealed that joy was evoked from the patient’s surroundings, either from feeling a sense of accomplishment from their own actions or from a reaction to their environment. Joy was primarily associated with moments of social connections with loved ones, in which solitary joy became a secondary and less strong form of joy. It was further discovered that participants in the treatment group often started their first interviews talking about joy directly linked with their treatments, but then transitioned to talking and writing about daily moments of joy. Finally, when compared to the control group who used journaling as an emotional outlet, the treatment group started to actually seek out joy in their daily lives. In finding that seeking out joy was used to disrupt negative outcomes with treatments, it is indicated that journaling about joy is useful for improving patients’ outlook towards their social and emotional environment when undergoing medical treatments for infertility.