Survey of self-concept and ways to overcome the stress for congenital visually impaired adolescents (12-18 ages)

The aim of this thesis is to examine to what extent visually impaired adolescents develop self-concept and ways of overcoming the stress. In general, individuals with disabilities are more likely to be open to the stress. Visually impaired people are one of the groups having difficulty in living in the society. These handicapped people encounter a great deal of problems in both private and public areas due to their disabilities, including physical, environmental and social difficulties. They need to cope with psychosocial stress factors like ostracisation, discrimination and common prejudice. So, how and in what level do these individuals cope with the stress and what mechanisms do they use to cope with the stress? Sight has a great importance in recognizing and making sense of the environment. This study aims at to what extent self-concept is developed in visually impaired individuals. This study is conducted with congenital visually impaired adolescents (12-18 ages). This study was carried out in Türkan Sabancı Secondary School for the Blind, Veysel Vardal Elementary School for the Blind and Six Dots Foundation for the Blind in Istanbul, and the study consists of 104 adolescents (57 male and 47 female). As a result of this study, there is a significant difference in terms of individual's gender, receiving special education, having socially supportive relatives/friends, upbringing and frequency of seeing ophthalmologist. Also, there is a significant difference for our visually impaired group in way of overcoming the stress in terms of upbringing and whether or not having a chronical physical illness and socially supportive relatives/friends.