A psychodynamic understanding of parental stress among parents of children with learning and developmental disability and behaviours that challenge

Abstract

A significant minority of parents of children with learning and developmental disability experience elevated levels of parental stress, particularly when their children present with behaviours that challenge. A small but influential number of psychoanalytic authors have made significant contributions to the learning disability field of research, however, the psychological distress of parents whose children have behaviours that challenge has received scant attention. This paper posits that distressed parents of children with learning and developmental disability and behaviours that challenge often make use of primary defences, which are linked with their children’s behaviour, albeit in a reciprocal rather than causal manner.

Keywords:

• learning and developmental disability
• parental stress
• psychodynamic therapy

Acknowledgement

This research was made possible by the Western Cape Forum for Intellectual Disabilities.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Vera Grover Fund. This work is based on the research supported in part by the National Research Foundation of South Africa (Grant specific unique reference number (UID) 85423). The Grantholder (LS) acknow ledges that opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in any publication generated by the NRF supported research are that of the authors, and that the NRF accepts no liability whatsoever in this regard.