Relationship between Materanl Stress and Mother-child Interaction Style among the Mothers of Cerebral Palsy Children

Cerebral palsy, which is described as broad spectrum of motor disability and is non-progressive in nature, brings about fresh challenges for the whole family . The aim of this study is to determine the relationship between stress among the mothers of children with cerebral palsy and quality of mother's interaction patterns while interacting with their children during an unstructured play. It was hypothesized that the level of stress among mothers of children with cerebral palsy will significantly impact the quality of interaction between mother and the child. A purposive sample of 38 children suffering with cerebral palsy, along with their mothers was selected from a rehabilitation center in Allahabad city. Mother's stress level was measured using Parenting Stress Index (Abidin, 1995). Quality of mother-child interaction style was measured by rating maternal behavior patterns on Maternal Behavior Rating Scale (Mahoney, 1992), by observing seven minutes video of mother-child interaction during an unstructured play. A correlation analysis was done for the relationship between maternal stress level and three components of maternal interaction style i. e. responsiveness, affect and directiveness. Regression analysis for maternal stress was also done to predict the variability in maternal behavioral patterns. The results indicated that mothers' stress level lies in the clinical range and the maternal stress was related non-significantly to the maternal responsiveness and significantly to the maternal affect and directiveness. To conclude, parenting stress was related to the mother's style of interaction (affect and directive-ness) with their children, which means that high level of maternal stress interferes with mother's effectiveness at engaging in quality interaction with their children.