Research Paper
The International Journal of Indian Psychology
ISSN 2348-5396 (Online) | ISSN: 2349-3429 (Print)
Volume 9, Issue 2, April- June, 2021
DIP: 18.01.038.20210902, DOI: 10.25215.0902.038
http://www.ijip.in
© 2021, Hashir Ahammed A V; licensee IJIP. This is an Open Access Research distributed under the terms of
the Creative Commons Attribution License (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits
unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any Medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Quality of Life, Parental Stress & Perceived Social Support
Among Parents of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder
Hashir Ahammed A V
1
*
ABSTRACT
This Research study aims to investigate the Quality of life, Parental stress and Perceived
social support among parents of children with autism spectrum disorder. This was Ex-post
facto research design followed by between group research designs would be utilized in
studying the relationship between the Quality of life, Parental stress and Perceived social
support among parents of children with autistic disorder and to understand the differences
between the parents on psychological attributes. The sample of the study consists of 40
parents. The participants enrolled in the study included 40 biological parents (23 fathers; 17
mothers) those who are residing in Bangalore, India. Quality of life was determined using
WHOQOL-BREF; Parental stress was determined using Parental Stress Scale of Berry and
Jones; Perceived social support was determined using Multidimensional Scale of Perceived
Social Support (MSPSS) of Zimet, Dahlem, Zimet & Farley. The Independent t-test results
revealed there is no significant difference on the mean scores of quality of life between
fathers and mothers of children with autism spectrum disorder, that there is no significant
difference on the mean scores of parental stress between fathers and mothers of children with
autism spectrum disorder, and also there is a significant difference on the mean scores of
perceived social support between fathers and mothers of children with autism spectrum
disorder. Pearson product moment correlation results revealed that there is highly significant
negative correlation between quality of life and parental stress among parents of children
with autism spectrum disorder, there is a highly significant positive correlation quality of life
and perceived social support among parents of children with autism spectrum disorder.
Keywords: Autism, Quality of life, Parental stress, Perceived social support
utism spectrum disorders (ASD) are a group of life-long neurodevelopment
conditions characterised by significant deficits in the social and communication
domains and by restrictive, repetitive and ritualistic patterns of behaviour, interests or
activities American Psychiatric Association (APA), (2013). In recent years, there has been a
marked increase in ASD prevalence in India, Approx. 1 in 500 or 0.20% or more than
2,160,000 people are diagnosed with Autism spectrum disorder (Barua & Tamara, 2018). The
increasing levels of ASD stress the need for early identification of the disorder and for
targeted interventions in order to improve children’s prognosis. Treatment for ASD typically
1
Consultant Psychologist, Human Care Foundation, Kozhikode, India
*Corresponding Author
Received: March 10, 2021; Revision Received: April 10, 2021; Accepted: May 03, 2021
A