Resilience and stress among family caregivers of children and adolescents with disabilities
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.70577/asce.v5i3.1033Keywords:
Family, People with Disabilities, Mental Health, Mental StressAbstract
Caring for children and adolescents with disabilities involves constant demands for support, supervision, and guidance, which can lead to high levels of stress and affect the coping resources of those who assume this responsibility. In the Ecuadorian context, there are few studies that jointly analyze perceived stress and resilience among family caregivers. The objective of this study was to examine the relationship between perceived stress and resilience among family caregivers of children and adolescents with disabilities. A quantitative, non-experimental, correlational, and cross-sectional study was conducted with the participation of 74 caregivers (58 mothers, 9 fathers, 3 siblings, and 4 grandparents) aged 21 to 77 years, selected through non-probabilistic convenience sampling. The Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10) and the Connor-Davidson Brief Resilience Scale (CD-RISC-10) were administered; subsequently, correlational analyses, nonparametric tests, multiple correspondence analyses, and linear regression were performed using IBM SPSS Statistics version 24. The results show a low but statistically significant negative correlation between stress and resilience (rs = -.301, p = .009); stress is associated with the child’s age and educational level, and resilience is related to the type of disability. Regression models indicate that stress and type of disability are associated with the observed variability in resilience. These findings provide evidence of the importance of the caregiver’s psychological resources and the characteristics of the family caregiving context.
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