Cargando…
Does Informal Caregiving Lead to Parental Burnout? Comparing Parents Having (or Not) Children With Mental and Physical Issues
Introduction: Parenting a child with special needs (CSN) may be an important challenge. Previous research has highlighted an increased risk of parental burnout among parents caring for their CSN. Yet, these studies only focused on children with specific issues and did not consider the wide variety o...
Autores principales: | , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Frontiers Media S.A.
2018
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5997813/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29928242 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00884 |
_version_ | 1783331116671827968 |
---|---|
author | Gérain, Pierre Zech, Emmanuelle |
author_facet | Gérain, Pierre Zech, Emmanuelle |
author_sort | Gérain, Pierre |
collection | PubMed |
description | Introduction: Parenting a child with special needs (CSN) may be an important challenge. Previous research has highlighted an increased risk of parental burnout among parents caring for their CSN. Yet, these studies only focused on children with specific issues and did not consider the wide variety of CSN. There is thus a need to take a more global approach to assessing the impact of caring for a CSN on parental burnout. In addition, the impact on parental burnout of personality and parenting (dis)agreement needs to be measured to have a better understanding of parent-caregivers’ (PCgs) burnout. Method: An online survey was completed by a large sample of parents from which a subsample of PCgs was identified. Results: T-tests highlighted significantly more parental burnout among parents of CSN. However, further analyses showed that parents with only one child with one special need did not experience significantly more burnout than parents with typical children. The significant difference lay in the presence of comorbidity or the presence of multiple CSN in the family. Hierarchical regressions showed an important impact of Neuroticism for every burnout facet, along with co-parenting (dis)agreement. Subjective consequences of having to care for a CSN were also related to the burnout facets of both emotional exhaustion and emotional distancing. Discussion: The presence of comorbidity and of multiple CSN in the family were related to more PCg burnout, emphasizing the need to consider these situations in further research. The role of neuroticism in PCg burnout confirms previous research both in parental and professional contexts. Parenting (dis)agreement also highlights the importance of dyadic support among parents. Finally, the importance of subjective aspects suggests that parental perception of their situation remains a central element in understanding the consequences of caregiving. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-5997813 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2018 |
publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-59978132018-06-20 Does Informal Caregiving Lead to Parental Burnout? Comparing Parents Having (or Not) Children With Mental and Physical Issues Gérain, Pierre Zech, Emmanuelle Front Psychol Psychology Introduction: Parenting a child with special needs (CSN) may be an important challenge. Previous research has highlighted an increased risk of parental burnout among parents caring for their CSN. Yet, these studies only focused on children with specific issues and did not consider the wide variety of CSN. There is thus a need to take a more global approach to assessing the impact of caring for a CSN on parental burnout. In addition, the impact on parental burnout of personality and parenting (dis)agreement needs to be measured to have a better understanding of parent-caregivers’ (PCgs) burnout. Method: An online survey was completed by a large sample of parents from which a subsample of PCgs was identified. Results: T-tests highlighted significantly more parental burnout among parents of CSN. However, further analyses showed that parents with only one child with one special need did not experience significantly more burnout than parents with typical children. The significant difference lay in the presence of comorbidity or the presence of multiple CSN in the family. Hierarchical regressions showed an important impact of Neuroticism for every burnout facet, along with co-parenting (dis)agreement. Subjective consequences of having to care for a CSN were also related to the burnout facets of both emotional exhaustion and emotional distancing. Discussion: The presence of comorbidity and of multiple CSN in the family were related to more PCg burnout, emphasizing the need to consider these situations in further research. The role of neuroticism in PCg burnout confirms previous research both in parental and professional contexts. Parenting (dis)agreement also highlights the importance of dyadic support among parents. Finally, the importance of subjective aspects suggests that parental perception of their situation remains a central element in understanding the consequences of caregiving. Frontiers Media S.A. 2018-06-06 /pmc/articles/PMC5997813/ /pubmed/29928242 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00884 Text en Copyright © 2018 Gérain and Zech. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
spellingShingle | Psychology Gérain, Pierre Zech, Emmanuelle Does Informal Caregiving Lead to Parental Burnout? Comparing Parents Having (or Not) Children With Mental and Physical Issues |
title | Does Informal Caregiving Lead to Parental Burnout? Comparing Parents Having (or Not) Children With Mental and Physical Issues |
title_full | Does Informal Caregiving Lead to Parental Burnout? Comparing Parents Having (or Not) Children With Mental and Physical Issues |
title_fullStr | Does Informal Caregiving Lead to Parental Burnout? Comparing Parents Having (or Not) Children With Mental and Physical Issues |
title_full_unstemmed | Does Informal Caregiving Lead to Parental Burnout? Comparing Parents Having (or Not) Children With Mental and Physical Issues |
title_short | Does Informal Caregiving Lead to Parental Burnout? Comparing Parents Having (or Not) Children With Mental and Physical Issues |
title_sort | does informal caregiving lead to parental burnout? comparing parents having (or not) children with mental and physical issues |
topic | Psychology |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5997813/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29928242 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00884 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT gerainpierre doesinformalcaregivingleadtoparentalburnoutcomparingparentshavingornotchildrenwithmentalandphysicalissues AT zechemmanuelle doesinformalcaregivingleadtoparentalburnoutcomparingparentshavingornotchildrenwithmentalandphysicalissues |