The effect of exercise activities applied to mothers with special needs individuals on anxiety and hopelessness levels

The main purpose of this study is to investigate and evaluate the anxiety and hopelessness levels of mothers with special needs individuals who participated (experiment) and did not participate (control group) in a physical exercise program that lasted for 6 weeks and was regularly applied twice a week. This study was designed as a quasi-experimental study. In the research, a pretest-posttest control group research model was applied. The population of the study; The mothers (N=100) of the students who receive education in the Special Needs Education Center (ÖZGEM) affiliated to the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Social Services Department. Planned exercise activities were applied to the experimental group twice a week for 6 weeks, while the control group continued its routine life without being subject to any application. In order to determine the anxiety and hopelessness levels of the participants, the State and Trait Anxiety Inventory and Beck Hopelessness Scales were administered to both groups as pre-test and post-test. The analysis of the collected data was made with the IBM SPSS Statistics 25.0 program. In order to compare the experimental group and control groups in terms of scale variables, the Kolmogorov Smirnov normal distribution test was performed first. Mann Whitney U test was used to compare anxiety and hopelessness averages between groups, and Wilcoxon tests were used to compare pre- and post-test averages within groups. In all analyses, p<0.05 (two-sided) values were considered statistically significant. When the analysis result obtained within the scope of the research was evaluated statistically, a positive difference was obtained between the pre-test and post-test state scores of the experimental group. There was no statistically significant difference between the pretest and posttest state and trait anxiety scores of the control group. While a positive difference was obtained in the mean scores of the experimental group from the pretest and posttest beck hopelessness scale, there was no significant difference in the mean scores of the pretest and posttest beck hopelessness scale applied to the control group. Based on the results of the study findings, it was determined that physical exercise activities had a positive effect on anxiety and hopelessness levels. Keywords: Person with Special Needs, Mother with Special Needs Person, Physical Exercise, Anxiety, Hopelessness