The relationship between parent attitudes and social anxiety levels in children with language and speech disorders

Nowadays, parents have started to treat issues related to their children in a more sensitive manner compared to past. This sensitivity can become more self-sacrificing toward children with "Language and Speech Disorders". Families being extremely sensitive even in their children's slightest deficiency can also cause the children to encounter problems in certain points. Especially, when the families do not have sufficient knowledge in the beginning stages of stuttering, this can cause the stuttering to intensify by increasing the anxiety in the child. Although social anxiety develops more predominantly in stuttering children, it has been identified in the studies that parents' attitude is a potential factor in increasing or slowing down anxiety. Accordingly, it has been interpreted as a high possibility that stuttering lasts for a lifetime or goes down yet in young age. Within the context of the study, certain studies were conducted towards children with language and speech disorders who are at elementary school age in Malatya and their families on the purpose of evaluating the parental attitudes of children with language and speech disorders and to analyze the effects of these attitudes on the childrens' social anxiety levels. Appropriate interviews were held and surveys were conducted through the participation of 77 children with language and speech disorders and their families. Among the participant children, 59 are boys while 18 of them are girls. 1 of the boys are kindergartener, 8 of them are first graders, 32 of them second graders, 21 of them third graders, 9 of them fourth graders and 6 of them are middle schoolers. Our study was implement by implementing "Parenting Attitude Scale", "Attitude Towards Language and Speech Disorders and Questionnaire" and "Social Anxiety Scale For Children-Updated Form" scales. As a result of our studies, it was discovered that the authoritarian attitude of the parental attitude produces more effective results compared to other parental attitudes. It was identified that mother's attitude towards the children with language and speech disorders show a positive change as the age increases. Findings revealed that language and speech disorders results from the parents facing more problems as the income level decreases and increases the social anxiety in children. Moreover, a significant difference were determined between fathers who are middle school and high school graduates. Parenting Attitude Scale scores of the high school graduate were discovered to be higher. The Parenting Attitude Scale average of the participant fathers who are middle school graduates are lower compared to fathers who are high school graduates. These findings obtained in our studies and the information in the literature exhibit that the children with language and speech disorders are directly or indirectly affected by parental attitudes.