Burden of treatment, emotion work and parental burnout of mothers to children with or without special needs: A pilot study

Abstract

The psychological phenomenon of Parental Burnout (PB) results from an imbalance between continuous exposure to chronic parenting stress and available coping resources. The study’s aim was to examine relationships between mothers’ perceived burden of treatment and PB, and their ability to utilize emotion work (EW) as a psychological coping resource. Ninety-eight Israeli mothers (46 had children with special needs with disabilities—W-SND, and 52 had children without special needs—WO-SN) completed questionnaires assessing their perception of burden of treatment, EW and PB. According to the findings, mothers of children W-SND reported significantly higher PB, a higher perceived burden of treatment and deeper EW than mothers of children WO-SN. Additionally, among all the mothers, a positive significant correlation was found between perceived burden of treatment and PB, while among mothers of children W-SND, positive correlations were found between their perceived burden of treatment and deep EW, and between deep EW and PB. These findings suggest that among mothers of children W-SND, PB is related to their perception of the burden of treatment and to performing deep EW. Additional psychological, cultural and environmental factors should be investigated, in order to gain new perspectives regarding PB as a psychological phenomenon that affects parenting and the ability to utilize coping mechanisms for mothers generally and for mothers of children W-SND especially.

“God gave you a special child because you are special”: difficulties, coping strategies, and parental burnout of Jewish mothers – a qualitative study

“…The quantitative study examined the level of PB of 176 mothers of children W-SND (compared to 176 mothers of children WO-SN), and their background data were collected after conducting a pilot study to validate the research system and tools ( Findling et al, 2022 ). The results of the first quantitative phase of the research indicated that PB of mothers of children W-SND (non-orthodox and ultra-orthodox) was significantly higher than that of mothers of children WO-SN.…”

Holistic Understanding: A Qualitative Study on Parental and Teacher Experiences in Describing Coping Mechanisms Among Children with Special Needs in Indonesia

“…Crying as a positive response can be interpreted as feelings of emotion for the achievements obtained by the child. Crying as a negative response can be interpreted as a feeling of hopelessness in facing the child's condition (47,53).…”

“…This is in line with the results of previous studies on the experience of parents in caring for children with special needs stating that they feel hopeless when they realize that there is a large enough gap related to the development of their children with normal children their age. This is one of the factors triggering parental burnout in parents with children with special needs (47).…”

Postpartum Maternal Anxiety Affects the Development of Food Allergy Through Dietary and Gut Microbial Diversity During Early Infancy

“…Maternal stress and burnout due to physical and emotional exhaustion can hinder parents’ abilities to care for their children and provide appropriate responses. 10 Psychological and emotional problems, including anxiety and depression, have been reported by approximately 20% of women within the first year after giving birth. 11 Maternal anxiety during prenatal and postnatal periods can also affect their children’s emotional state.…”