The stress of the parents of the intellectually disabled children in Goa

This paper is an assessment of the stress borne by the parents who have intellectually disabled children. We have used cross-sectional descriptive method for the study. Through Stratified Random Sampling method six special schools are selected. The sample size of the parents is 116.  To assess the stress, we use Dr Satish Girimaji’s schedule, namely “Family Interview for Stress and Coping in Mental Retardation” (FISC – MR). With the help of the guide and other experts in the field, a stress questionnaire is prepared based on FISC – MR and tested for validity and reliability. The study shows the following results. Of the 116 parents, 12 have mild stress, 53 moderate, 47 severe and 4 have profound stress. The stress scores have the mean value of 53.57, median 54, mode 39, and the standard deviation 17.95. Parents stress scores are derived from 4 different subsections. They are Daily care stress, emotional stress, family stress and social stress. Among these Daily Care stress has the highest mean (16.90). The ‘t’ test and ANOVA are the statistical tools used. ANOVA results based on parents’ age, religion, income, birth order of the child and number of children – have the p value greater than the alpha level 0.05. This indicates that there is no statistically significant difference in the stress level of the parents with respect to these variables. For the education level of the parents, the p value 0.09, though not very significant, yet close to 0.05, shows that education does play a role. Among the variables, Occupation of the parents and the age of the child have the p value lesser than the alpha level (0.05), indicating that they do make significant difference in the stress level of the parents. The t test results indicate that there is no significant difference in the marital status, location and the type of family. Regarding the gender of the child, the p value (0.049) is lesser than .05. It indicates that there is a significant difference in the stress level of the parents who have an intellectually disabled female child as compared to the parents of the male child. Thus, it is evident that these parents go through enormous stress in caring for their special child.