The moderating effect of types of child’s neurodevelopmental disorder on the relationship between Indonesian mothers’ perception of child’s maladaptive behaviour and maternal parenting stress

Abstract

This study aimed to examine the effect of mother’s perception of child’s maladaptive behaviour and types of child’s neurodevelopment disorder on maternal parenting stress, and examine the role of types of child’s neurodevelopmental disorder in moderating the relationship between mother’ perception of child’s maladaptive behaviours and maternal parenting stress. The mother’ perception of child’s maladaptive behaviours tested included internalizing and externalizing maladaptive behaviours, while the types of child’s neurodevelopmental disorder included intellectual disability (ID), attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). A total of 163 mothers of children with different types of neurodevelopmental disorders were included in this study. The data were analysed with regression analysis, t-test, and ANOVA. The results showed that 1) there is an influence of the mother’s perception of child’s maladaptive behaviours and types of neurodevelopmental disorders on parenting stress; 2) types of child neurodevelopmental disorders moderate the relationship between the mother’s perception of child’s maladaptive behaviour and maternal parenting stress; 3) mothers of children with ASD experience higher levels parenting stress than mothers of children with ADHD and ID.