Family quality of life of Chinese families of children with intellectual disabilities.
The Family Quality of Life Scale keeps its five-factor shape in China, so you can safely use it to spot housing, income, and transport needs that block family progress.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team gave the Family Quality of Life Scale to 442 Chinese families who have a child with intellectual disability.
They ran a confirmatory factor analysis to see if the same five areas used in the United States—family interaction, parenting, emotional well-being, physical/material well-being, and disability-related support—showed up in China.
What they found
The five-factor structure fit the Chinese data well.
Housing, transportation, income, and how severe the child’s disability is predicted how satisfied families felt.
How this fits with other research
Madden et al. (2003) built the original five-factor survey in the United States; Hu et al. (2012) now show it works in China, so you can compare scores across cultures.
Lin et al. (2009) found Chinese caregivers scored lower than the general public on quality of life; the new study gives you a tool to find exactly which life areas need help.
Matson et al. (2013) reported that most Chinese caregivers feel stigma and distress; pairing their warning with the validated scale lets you measure whether better housing or income actually eases that stress.
Why it matters
You now have a brief, culturally valid survey to pinpoint what is dragging a family down—often housing, money, or transport, not the disability itself.
Use the scores to write goals that fix concrete problems like finding a closer dentist, bus route, or subsidy before stress spills into session time.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
BACKGROUND: The concepts of quality of life and family quality of life (FQOL) are increasingly being studied in the field of intellectual disabilities (ID) in China as important frameworks for: (1) assessing families' need for supports and services; (2) guiding organisational and service delivery system changes; and (3) evaluating quality family outcomes. The present study focused on exploring the perceptions of Chinese families who have a child with an ID regarding FQOL as well as examining the factor structure of FQOL concept from Chinese families. METHODS: The Chinese version of the Family Quality of Life Scale was used to survey Chinese families living in the urban and suburban areas of Beijing who have a child with ID. A total of 442 families participated in this study. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the factor structure of FQOL. Multivariate analysis was also used to examine group differences among families in terms of family demographic variables. RESULTS: A five-factor structure of the FQOL construct was found in the Chinese sample, suggesting a similar factor structure found from US families in the literature. Different living conditions (e.g. housing and transportation) tended to affect significantly families' satisfaction ratings of their FQOL. It is also found that family income and severity of disability of the child are predictors of families' satisfaction ratings of FQOL. CONCLUSION: The preliminary findings of this study suggest a cross-cultural factor structure comparability of FQOL between samples in the USA and China. Results call for further examination of the family-centred service and support as a mediator on the interactive relationship between family characteristics, family needs and FQOL outcomes.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 2012 · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2788.2011.01391.x