Psychological Association Conference attended by Denise M. Orme,
Ph.D. and Joan Thomas Spiegel, Ph.D. where they presented a paper
during on Developmental/Life Span. The title of which was Parental
Acceptance-Rejection: A follow-up study”.
The current study was a follow-up study (Orme, 2004) using the
Parental Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire (PARQ) Control Version
(Rohner & Khaleque, 2005) to try to better understand parents’
current attitudes toward their children with Down syndrome (DS) or
Autistic Disorder. The original qualitative study by Orme (2004)
examined mothers’ resolution or non-resolution of their children’s
disability of Down syndrome (DS) or autism. The children ranged from
birth to 4 years with 18 mothers in the original study. The mothers
were interviewed using Pianta and Marvin’s (1992) Reaction to
Diagnosis Interview (RDI) (which is a series of five open-ended
interview questions), followed by a 6-week cognitive intervention.
The data was analyzed using grounded theory, and a new category of
resolution was discovered–resolving, as well as new subcategories of
ambivalence for the category of unresolved and cognitive reframing
for the category of resolved. A new subcategory of spiritual
support/beliefs was found for both resolving and resolved. Three
years later, ten of the 18 original mothers of children with DS or
Autistic Disorder were assessed using the PARQ-Control. It was found
that for all original resolution categories, the means of the Total
PARQ score fell well within normal limits of 90-110 (Rohner, 1999).
An Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was conducted to determine whether
there were significant differences between means of the resolution
groups. Despite the small sample size, two areas of significant
interest were found. The Total PARQ score was significant between the
three resolution groups, F(2, 9) = 4.753, p = .05. The primary area
in which the resolution groups varied was in the scale of
Warmth/Affection, F(2, 9) = 12.273, p = .005. The results of the PARQ
follow-up study indicate that the mothers of children with Down
syndrome or autism are able to accept their children to a similar
degree as non-disabled children. The results of this research have
implications for further study using the cognitive intervention with
a larger and more diverse group of participants.