Psychosocial correlates of parenting a child with autistic disorder.

BACKGROUND

The lifelong experience of raising a child with a complex developmental disability such as autistic disorder is considered one of the most significant parenting stressors, with the potential to spill over into various areas of the life of parents. Therefore, studying the psychological functioning for parents of children with developmental disabilities requires the consideration of multiple factors acting and interacting concurrently.

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between two sets of variables in a sample of parents of children with autistic disorder. The first set was composed of the parents' characteristics and the coping strategies used. The second set was composed of three stress subscales-parental distress (PD), parent-child dysfunctional interaction (PCDI), and difficult child (DC)-and the parental quality of life (QOL).

METHODS

Canonical correlation multivariate analysis was used to examine the relationship between the sets of variables in 184 Jordanian parents of children with autistic disorder.

RESULTS

The analyses revealed that the parents who have higher incomes, use diverse problem-solving strategies, exhibit less escape-avoidance, and exhibit less responsibility acceptance behavior tended to report lower PD, PCDI, and DC scores and a higher QOL score. The analyses also revealed that being an older parent, having more time since the child's autistic diagnosis, and using more distancing coping strategies were associated with lower PD scores, higher PCDI and DC scores, and better QOL.

CONCLUSIONS

This study is the first to investigate a wide range of parental psychosocial impacts as well as several sociodemographic factors that are possibly associated with raising a child with autistic disorder. The results indicate that health professionals working with parents of children with autistic disorder need to consider holistically the factors that can potentially affect the parents' health and well-being and provide care that focuses on the parents as both clients and caregivers.