Relationship between parental personality, mood disorders and family functions of the children with autism spectrum disorder

Abstract

Objective The number of children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has increased dramatically in the past years.Parents of children with ASD usually experience a variety of chronic and acute stressors that may decrease marital satisfaction and family functioning.The aim was to explore the characteristics of parental personality, mood disorders and family functions of the Children with ASD and to explore the relevance factors in order to draw out methods to improve parental family functions. Methods A cross-sectional survey was conducted and 593 outpatients with ASD diagnosed in Shanghai Mental Health Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine form January 2010 to January 2014 were straight into the group, their parents were tested by Family Assessment Device (FAD), Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale(SDS), Zung Self-Rating Anxiety Scale(SAS) and Eysenck Personality Questionnaire(EPQ). SPSS 17.0 software was adopted to establish the database and statistical analysis. Results According to FAD, parents of children with ASD had lower scores in problem solving[(2.10±0.37) scores] and roles[(2.09±0.27) scores](t=-6.669, P=0.000; t=-18.707, P=0.000)than the standard scores, while other dimensions score were significantly higher than the standard scores in communicdtion[(2.25±0.35) scores], emotional reaction[(2.38±0.40) scores], emotional involvement[(2.36±0.37) scores], behavioral control[(2.31±0.27) scores] and general function[(2.12±0.38) scores], there were significant differences(t=3.135, 11.115, 16.997, 37.116, 8.064; P=0.002, 0.000, 0.000, 0.000, 0.000). For EPQ of parents, mother had obviously higher scores than father in psychoticism scale[(53.68±1.36) scores vs (52.65±1.17) scores, t=-13.841, P=0.000], and significantly lower scores in Lie scale[(52.27±0.79) scores vs (52.17±0.75) scores, t=2.449, P=0.014]. Compared to fathers, mothers were coded as higher depression and anxiety scores(t=-6.276, -6.440, all P=0.000) and higher prevalence rate(χ2=15.893, 27.592, all P=0.000), which were statistically significant.According to the association study of FAD and the others(especially in mood of parents), it was found that several dimensions showed obvious correlation. Conclusions Parents of children with ASD have family function damaged badly, except for problem solving and roles.The parents showed different personality traits and mood disorders, particularly mothers' mood disorder problem was prominent.Parental family functioning were closely related to their personality traits and emotional disorders in various dimensionalities, which was worthy of attention. Key words: Autism spectrum disorders; Family function; Personality; Mood disorders; Parents