RESILIENCE, SOCIAL SUPPORT, AND COPING AMONG THE MOTHERS WITH DISABLED AND NONDISABLED CHILDREN

Dr. Sema Kaner
Ankara University
Hatice Bayrakli
Mamak Saimekadın Elementary School

Abstract

Having a disabled child is a very traumatic situation for many parents. While some of the parents having a disabled child can make positive adaptation to this situation and express a positive attitude toward life, others can not cope with it well, do not use available resources and feel dissatisfaction and unhappiness with their lives. What makes people resistant to stressful conditions is called resiliency. Resiliency is an adaptive process and refers to a cognitive capacity preventing psychopathology despite the adversities. Both social support and problem-focused coping strategies protect individuals from potentially harmful effects of stressful events, produce resilient responses to stressful situations and affect physical and mental health outcomes in a positive direction. In this study, the relationships between resilience, social support, and coping among mothers having disabled and nondisabled children were investigated. The research group consisted of 481 mothers in total; 249 with disabled children, and 232 with a nondisabled child. Data was gathered via Family Resilience Scale, Revised Parental Social Support Scale, and Coping Style Scale. The same results were obtained for both groups after the analyses. Correlational analyses showed that there are significant and positive relationships between qualitative and quantitative social support, resilience and problem-focused coping strategies. On the other hand, significant and negative correlations between social support, resilience, and emotion-focused coping strategies are found. Regression analyses demonstrated that satisfaction as a result of social support, problem-focused and emotion-focused coping strategies are important predictors of the resilience in mothers. The current study revealed that problem-focused coping strategies and social supports are protective factors in terms of maternal resilience.

Keywords

Resilience, Social support, Coping, Mothers with disabled or nondisabled children