Personal Predictors of Parents’ Educational Aspirations for their Children with Disabilities

Abstract

In order to address the main research problem, the authors determined the correlation between personal predictors, i.e. the level of self-esteem measured by Fitts’ Tennessee Self-Concept Scale, the styles of coping with stress examined by Endler & Parkers’ Coping Inventory for Stressful Situations, the intensity of social support measured by Norbeck Social Support Questionnaire, and the level of educational aspirations of parents of children with disabilities, assessed by K. Parental Aspirations Questionnaire. The research involved 247 mothers and fathers of children with visual, auditory, motor and intellectual disabilities. Only full families were investigated. The research relied on multiple step-wise regression analysis, factor analysis, and path analysis for mothers and fathers separately. The high level of aspirations for the education of children with disabilities was dependent on the positive self-esteem of both mothers and fathers. The article presents a discussion of the results, study limitations, practical implications and future research areas.