Year: 2019
Type: dissertation
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Children with developmental disabilities often present with increased behavioral\n\nproblems and a decreased social skill repertoire. These characteristics often directly\n\nimpact caregiver’s own stress and pose challenges in the home. Less is known about how\n\nthe presence of a child in the home with a disability impacts their siblings. Further, the\n\nliterature is mixed surrounding if brothers and sisters of children with developmental\n\ndisabilities are more or less adjusted than siblings of children that are typically\n\ndeveloping. There is also a gap surrounding how parenting multiple children, when at\n\nleast one of the children has a developmental disability, impacts parental stress. The\n\ncurrent study explored how target child factors, sibling factors, and other parent and\n\nfamily factors can influence parental stress. Forty-one families participated in this study\n\nand provided information on themselves, their target preschool-aged child with a\n\ndevelopmental disability, and an older identified sibling. Higher behavior problems and\n\nlower social skills in the target child predicted parental stress; however, these variables in\n\nthe siblings did not. Dyadic adjustment was found to serve as a protective factor against\n\nparental stress after accounting for the influence of the target child’s and the sibling’s\n\nbehavior problems. Target child behavior problems predicted parental stress after\n\naccounting for common familial stressors. Future research could explore other parent outcome variables that might be influenced by multiple children. Future research could be conducted that focuses on sibling adjustment as an outcome, as well as leveraging\n\nsiblings as informants to get their perspectives on impact of having a brother or sister\n\nwith a disability. Additionally, sibling perspectives on family life and family adjustment\n\ncould also be investigated.
Author: Jillian Tuso
Language: English
Subfield: Clinical Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2979514860