title: The impact of maternal perceptions and medical severity on the adjustment of children with congenital heart disease.
abstract: Hypothesized that maternal perceptions would be more significant predictors of emotional adjustment than medical severity. Mothers of 99 children, between the ages 4-10 years, completed the Child Behavior Checklist, Parenting Stress Index, Parental Locus of Control Scale, and a measure of perception of medical severity. Assessed medical severity by number of hospitalizations, operations, catheterizations, hospital days, outpatient visits, and a cardiologist's rating of illness severity. Maternal perceptions were potent predictors of emotional adjustment. Approximately 33% of the variability in adjustment was accounted for by maternal perceptions, while the medical severity accounted for less than 3% of the variability. Severity of illness appears less critical to successful adaptation than the quality of the mother-child relationship.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Children's Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts 02115.
authors.forename: D R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: DeMaso
authors.forename: L K
authors.initials: LK
authors.lastname: Campis
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Wypij
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bertram
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lipshitz
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Freed
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006330:Heart Defects, Congenital / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008297:Male; D008425:Maternal Behavior; D009034:Mother-Child Relations; D010556:Personality Tests; D012803:Sick Role