The stability of the Ways of Coping (Revised) Questionnaire over time in parents of children with Down's syndrome: a research note.

The stability of the Ways of Coping (Revised) Questionnaire over time was assessed by comparing the scores of 68 mothers and 53 fathers of school-aged children with Down's syndrome over a 3-year time interval on the five coping strategy subscales described by Knussen et al. (1992). For this analysis, mothers' and fathers' scores were analysed separately. It was shown by t tests that mothers' and fathers' scores on the coping strategy subscales had not significantly changed over the three-year period. Time 1 and Time 2 scores on all of the coping subscales were strongly positively associated, with the exception of fathers' scores on the Stoicism subscale. Test-retest reliability was adequate for all subscales except mothers' scores on the Passive Acceptance subscale and fathers' scores on the Stoicism subscale. These results, by demonstrating the stability of the Ways of Coping (Revised) Questionnaire over a 3-year time period, further illustrate the utility of this instrument for investigating coping with families with special problems.