Research on depression levels and problem-solving skills of mothers who have a disabled child and mothers who do not have a disabled child

Families that underlie the society may experience some psychological problems in their lives from time to time and may take different steps to solve them. However, families with disabled child may be ineffective in solving these psychological, emotional, physical, economic and social problems relating to their disabled children. Besides having a disabled child, especially the mothers take more responsibility and suffer from these problems more intensively. However, having a disabled child is not the only reason why the mothers with disabled child have psychological problems and difficulties in problem-solving. Researches suggest that there are many factors that can affect psychological problems and problem-solving skills, apart from having a disabled child. The aim of this research is to examine the depression levels and problem-solving skills of mothers with disabled child by comparing with those of the mothers who do not have disabled child. The sample of the study consists of 40 mothers with disabled child who are educated at Private Silivri Special Education and Rehabilitation Center in Silivri, Istanbul, and 37 mothers having healthy children living in the same district. Personal Information Form, Beck Depression Scale, and Problem Solving Skills Scale were applied to participants and the collected data were analyzed by using SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) for Windows 15.0 software. As a result of the analysis, because the data were not normally distributed and not homogeneous, Independent-Samples T-Test, one of the parametric tests, was applied for the analysis of depression and problem-solving levels of the families with a disabled child and families with healthy child. On the other hand, the Kruskal-Wallis H Test was applied to determine whether the depression and problem-solving levels of the mothers with a disabled child vary according to their age, educational status, income levels, elapsed time since the diagnosis of the disability in terms of years, and duration of the special education they had in terms of years. The findings were interpreted in 95% confidence interval at 0.05 significance level. When the findings obtained from the research were evaluated, it was determined that depression levels and problem-solving skills of mothers with disabled child were within normal limits. Besides, it was determined that having a disabled child, the age, educational status, income levels, elapsed time since the diagnosis of the disability in terms of years, and the duration of the special education they had in terms of years have no significant effect on the depression and problem-solving levels of the mothers with a disabled child. Key words: Depression, problem-solving skills, mother with a disabled child.