The nature of disorder, related diagnostic procedures and engagement of different
experts expose families with children with autism spectrum disorders to a wide array
of emotions, changes in family dynamics, exhaustion, and stigma. As an individual
evolves from a child to adolescent, there are additional, new challenges for an
individual and his/her family. A number of stressors that these families face, impact
them differently at different stages of life. Family resilience theory studies how
successfully a family copes with stress or family crisis, primary aim of the studies is the
process of adapting to changes.
The research allowed us to determine the current state of family resilience for families
with children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorders with respect to the
specifics of each autistic disorder. The results of the research should help us identify
specific areas that may require additional support for these families. Another important
aim of research was to determine if family resilience depends on the age of children,
type of education programme, co-occurrence of disorders and the educational
attainment of parents.
Research included 38 two-parent families, who had known about the autism spectrum
disorder diagnosis at least 17 months before, the age of children ranged between 6
and 18. The survey Family Resilience Assessment Scale (Sixbey, 2005), was adapted
to serve the purpose of our research.
The results prove that the area of highest family resilience is making sense of negative
events, followed by the area of communication and problem-solving, and the area of
maintaining positive attitude. The domains of family connectedness and use of social
and economic sources demonstrated slightly lower family resilience, the lowest result
was established for the area of spirituality, which is also the area in which families
displayed the highest level of heterogeneity. It was also established that families’ selfassessment
of the resilience was not influenced by the age of a child or adolescent
with autistic spectrum disorder, type of education programme, co-occurrence of
disorders nor the fact whether autistic disorder is a major or isolated occurrence in
family life. The obtained results served as a base for devising guidelines for socioeducational
staff, who deal with families with children and adolescents with autistic
spectrum disorder.
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