"The clumsiness is always present": Parents perspectives of their adolescents with pDCD.
Parents of teens with pDCD see more daily struggle and emotional load than the teens report—collect both views before writing goals.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Tal-Saban et al. (2023) talked to parents of teens with probable developmental coordination disorder (pDCD). They asked open questions about daily life, school, and feelings.
The team recorded and coded the answers for common themes. They wanted to know what parents see that tests might miss.
What they found
Parents said clumsiness is "always present" and spills into homework, sports, and friendships. They also reported more worry and sadness than their teens admitted.
In short, parents painted a heavier picture of struggle than the adolescents themselves did.
How this fits with other research
Khairati et al. (2024) asked the same questions to the teens and heard the same daily hassles, but the teens rated their own mood as "not that bad." The two studies are conceptual replications that show one clear gap: parent score higher on stress, teen score lower.
Kumar et al. (2025) pooled many quality-of-life papers and found the same pattern across ages: parents always report bigger social and school impacts than their kids. The meta-analysis turns the single-study gap into a stable trend.
Tal-Saban et al. (2012) followed young adults with suspected DCD and proved the problems do not fade after high school. The new parent voices fit like a puzzle piece, showing the worries start early and stay.
Jarus et al. (2011) and Izadi-Najafabadi et al. (2019) showed younger children with DCD already join fewer clubs and sports. The teen parent stories now explain why: ongoing fear of failure and lack of support.
Why it matters
If you only hand the teen a self-report form, you may miss half the story. Ask parents too, then compare. Use both views to pick goals that matter at home and at school, and to justify services that look beyond motor skills.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
AIM: This study elicited the perspectives of parents of adolescents with probable Developmental Coordination Disorder (pDCD) of the implications of DCD on their adolescents' daily-life and the parents' coping strategies and future concerns. METHODS: Using a phenomenological approach and thematic analysis, we conducted a focus group including 7 parents of adolescents with pDCD aged 12-18 yrs. FINDINGS: Three major themes emerged from the data: (a) Manifestation and implications of DCD; Parents described the performance challenges and strengths of their adolescents; (b) Discrepancy in perceptions of DCD: Parents described a gap between them and their children's, and between the parents themselves, in their views of the child's difficulties; (c) Diagnosis of DCD and strategies for overcoming its implications: Parents' expressed the pros and cons of labeling and described strategies they used to assist their children. CONCLUSIONS: It appears that adolescents with pDCD continue to experience performance limitations in daily-life activities, and psychosocial difficulties. Yet, parents and their adolescents do not always view these limitations in a similar manner. Therefore, it is important that clinicians obtain information from both parents and their adolescents'. These results may assist in developing a client-centered intervention protocol for parents and adolescents.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2023 · doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2023.104560