Self-esteem of parents with intellectually disabled children in relation to the support of selected social groups

Introduction: In the literature on the problem of social support, besides family sources of support, (husband, wife, children, parents, siblings, relatives), a role of friends, acquaintances and neighbors is emphasized. Purpose: To assess types and level of support that parents receive from specific social groups. Materials and methods: The study included 108 mothers and 108 fathers of intellectually disabled children. We used the original questionnaire and the standardized scale of Social Support by KmiecikBaran. Results: There were differences between the parents in emotional support (standard deviation 3.519), the lowest in informative support (deviation 2.744). General support was poor in the opinion of 34.6% of the parents. Average institutional support related to 42.9% of the parents, strong evaluative support – 37.1% and strong emotional support – 41%. The parents received the strongest informative, institutional, evaluative and emotional support from nurses and physicians. Spouses of the examined gave them poor informative, emotional and institutional support and average evaluative support. Statistically, the fathers received significantly stronger evaluative and emotional support – by more than one point, and by more than 3 points in case of general support than mothers. Conclusions: The parents received average social support, however, it was below the average for the Polish adult population. The spouses gave them poor informative, emotional and institutional support and average evaluative support; teachers, physicians and nurses – average support in all categories, however, in case of the two latter – institutional and evaluative support was close to the above-average values. The fathers enjoyed moderately stronger evaluative, emotional and general support from teachers, physicians and nurses than mothers.