Parental stress and support perception in southern Italy's households with intellectual disabilities and/or autistic spectrum disorder before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Lockdown erased therapy and school for Italian families with ID/ASD, pushing parent stress up and support down.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Marcone et al. (2023) sent an online survey to families in southern Italy. All families had a child with autism or intellectual disability.
They asked parents about stress, help from friends, school, and therapy before and during COVID-19 lockdown.
What they found
Parents said their stress shot up and support dropped during lockdown.
Therapy and school days almost disappeared. Families felt left alone.
How this fits with other research
Isensee et al. (2022) and Alhuzimi (2021) ran similar surveys in Germany, Austria, and Saudi Arabia. All three studies show the same pattern: lockdown raises parent stress and cuts services.
Bolbocean et al. (2022) looked at families of children with syndromic autism. Their stress stayed flat, not up. The difference: these families already had strong support teams and routines, so lockdown hurt them less.
Alharbi (2024) adds that Italian-style stress also showed up as eating problems and broken daily routines in Saudi kids.
Why it matters
If you serve families with autism or ID, expect crisis plans to fail if they rely only on outside therapy. Build two back-up systems: one for remote coaching and one for peer support. Check support levels at every contact; when they drop, stress rises fast.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
The stress experienced by parents of persons with Intellectual Disability (ID) and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is higher than that of parents of neurotypical children (TD). An important protective factor is the perception of the support received within the family and the social network. The emergency of the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative impact on the health of people with ASD/ID and their families. The aim of the study was to describe the levels of parental stress and anxiety before and during the lockdown in southern Italy's families with ASD/ID persons and analyze how the levels of support perceived by these families. 106 parents, the ages of 23 and 74 years (M = 45; SD = 9), from southern Italy responded to an online battery of questionnaires measuring parental stress, anxiety, perception of support and attendance at school activities and rehabilitation centers, before and during lockdown. In addition, descriptive, Chi-Square, MANOVA, ANOVAs, and correlational analyses were conducted. The results showed that during the lockdown, attendance at therapies and extra-moenia activities and participation in school activities drastically dropped. During lockdown, parents felt inadequate. The parental stress and anxiety were moderate, but the perception of support dropped significantly.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2023 · doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2023.104537