Stress and coping in mothers of children with developmental disabilities across the lifespan.

Maternal stress associated with providing care at home for a son/daughter with a developmental disability was investigated using a cross-sectional design. Respondents included 186 mothers whose offspring ranged in age from 5 to 53 years. New measures were created to assess the contribution of stressors, resources, and the perception of stressors to the prediction of stress. Resources and perception were evaluated to determine if they had a moderating effect on stress. A negative relationship was found between maternal stress and age of the son/daughter with the developmental disability and between maternal stress and age of the mother. The statistical significance of the stressors, resources, and perceptions in predicting stress varied across the son/daughter's age and the mother's age. When collapsing across age, stressors and perceptions were found to be the best predictors of maternal stress. Perception of the stressor was found to have a moderating effect on stress only if there was a high number of stressors present in the family environment. Implications of these findings and suggestions for future research are discussed.Dept. of Psychology. Paper copy at Leddy Library: Theses & Major Papers - Basement, West Bldg. / Call Number: Thesis1997 .L5. Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 37-01, page: 0367. Adviser: Robert Orr. Thesis (M.A.)--University of Windsor (Canada), 1997.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.A.

Level thesis:degree_level

Masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Psychology

Grantor

University of Windsor

Year dc:date.issued

1997

Author dc:creator

• Li, Nicole Stacey.

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Orr, Robert,

Licence

• http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Language dc:language.iso

en_CA

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14776/3616

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:uwindsor.scholaris.ca:20.500.14776/3616