Parents' Positive and Negative Cognitive Appraisals in Raising A Child with an Autism Spectrum Disorder

Parents caring for a child with a disability experience significantly more stress in comparison to parents with children without a disability. Caring for a child with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has been reported to be more stressful than caring for a child with other types of disabilities. The concept of cognitive appraisal was used as a method to examine and understand how parents adapt to having a child with a disability. A cognitive appraisal can be positive or negative, depending on parents' interpretation of the consequences of an event. The negative and positive cognitive appraisals that parents make while raising their child with autism, as well as potential factors contributing to their appraisals were investigated, including family quality of life, authoritative parenting, and the child's adaptive and aberrant behaviour. Fifty-four families with a child between 6 and 9 years old participated. In order to confirm the child's diagnosis of autism, gold-standard diagnostic measures for ASD were administered which entailed an interview for the parent and a direct observation of the child's behaviour. Questionnaires and interviews were completed by one parent per family regarding cognitive appraisal of disability, family quality of life, parenting style, adaptive behaviour and aberrant behaviour. The child's cognitive functioning was assessed. Two multiple linear regression analyses were performed, one for each outcome: positive cognitive appraisal and negative cognitive appraisal. Family quality of life predicted 36.6% of the variance in negative cognitive appraisal, and the relationship between the two variables was inverse, such that parents reporting higher satisfaction with their family quality of life reported that lower negative cognitive appraisals. This study contributes to research literature concerning the negative consequences of caring for a child with autism, and emphasizes the importance of implementing and developing interventions in which positive and negative cognitive appraisal are considered.