PARENT-TO-PARENT SUPPORT PERCEPTION SCALE FOR FAMILIES WITH CHILDREN WITH DISABILITY: SCALE DEVELOPMENT STUDY

Abstract

Background: Social support is the entirety of perceptions that make an individual feel that he/she is cared for, loved, trusted and valued within a network of mutual responsibility and communication. Research carried out on the subject of perceived social support have generally focused on how social support reduces or prevents stress and contributes to developing positive coping skills. Purpose: This study was conducted to evaluate the perceptions of the social support that families with children with disability expect from each other and to develop a culture-specific scale for this purpose as a contribution to the literature. Methods: This study was conducted in special education and rehabilitation centers in Zonguldak, Turkey. The study sample consisted of 420 parents who had a child or children enrolled at the centers and who had consented to participate. Data were collected using the Parent-to-Parent Support Perception Scale for Families with Children with Disability. The validity of content and construct was examined to evaluate the validity of the parent-to-parent support perception scale. Cronbach’s alpha was used to assess internal consistency reliability. Results: A 43-item pool of items was created for a 4-point Likert-type scale in the light of the literature in order to assess the support perceptions of parents with children with disability. After content validity was assessed by a panel of eight specialists, the number of items was determined to be 30. In the construct validity testing, the KMO value was 0.91 and Bartlett’s sphericity test resulted in 6134.24 (p = 0.001). The results of the factor analysis indicated a scale with 24 items, four factors, where R2 = 62.33%. The total Cronbach's alpha value for the scale is 0.94. Conclusions: According to the results of the analysis, the developed scale was found to have excellent validity and reliability for families with children with disability. What is currently known? When the literature is examined, there is no measurement tool that measures the perception of support from family to family for families of children with disabilities. What does this article add? The developed scale was found to have excellent content and construct validity and reliability for families with children with disability.