STUDY OF MENTAL HEALTH OF THE MOTHER’S WHOSE CHILDREN HAVE EITHER AUTISM OR DOWN SYNDROME

Abstract: The present study was conducted to study the level of mental health among the mothers whose children have either Autism disorder or Down syndrome. The mental health of mothers, who are primary care givers of these ‘special’ children is of great importance. The review of literature collected was compared to the present study. The tool selected for this research was Mental health inventory developed by Jagadish and A.K Srivastava. Totally 60 subjects were taken for this study and disturbed as 30 mothers of children with Autism disorder and 30 mothers of children with Down syndrome. Purposive sampling technique was used for collecting the data.

The validity of the tool has been, already established by the author. The pilot study was conducted on 30 subjects (15 mothers of children with Autism and 15 mothers of children with Down syndrome) to test the reliability of the tool. Fifteen hypothesis were formulated for collecting and analyzing the data. The data collection was done in four ‘special’ schools. They were located at Alwarpet, Raja Annamalaipuram, Besant nagar and Neelankarai. The test was administered to mothers of children with either Autism or Down syndrome. It took almost a month to finish the data collection. The collected data was tabulated and statistically analyzed. The formulated hypothesis was tested and the conclusions were drawn from the findings.

The results of the data analysis have shown that mental health affects the psychological well being of the mothers. The overall results proved the following.

• The mothers of children with either Autism disorder or Down syndrome have  almost the same level of Mental health.
• Mothers in the higher age bracket had better mental health than those who were younger.
• Working mothers showed better mental health when compared to mothers who are housewives.
• Urban mothers showed better mental health than mothers from the rural background.
• From the socio-economic stand point the mothers from the higher financial strata showed better mental health than those from the lower financial group.
• The mental health of mothers from the different education backgrounds were almost at par. Post graduates showed slightly better mental health than graduates and undergraduates.
• There was no difference in the mental health of mothers from the joint and nuclear family set up.
• The number of children the mother had, had no bearing on her mental health. The mental health of mothers with single children and those with more children, were on par with each other.
• The mental health of mothers whose children are from the different age groups (ie) below 10 years, between 10 years-20 years and those above 20 years, were almost equal.
• The gender of the ‘special’ child makes no difference to the psychological well being of the mother.
• Mothers of children with or without associated problems had the same level of metal health.
• Irrespective of the birth order of the child the mothers had the same level of mental health.
• The number of years the child attended school had no bearing on the mental health of the mothers.
• Irrespective of whether the child was medicated or not the mother’s mental health levels were at par. Irrespective of whether the child exhibited behavior problems or not the level of mental health for those mothers were almost similar.

Title: STUDY OF MENTAL HEALTH OF THE MOTHER’S WHOSE CHILDREN HAVE EITHER AUTISM OR DOWN SYNDROME

Author: V.Bhavani

International Journal of Social Science and Humanities Research 

ISSN 2348-3156 (Print), ISSN 2348-3164 (online)

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