Parental positive meaning-making when caregiving for children with asthma

Abstract

Providing informal care to children/adolescents with chronic conditions has been associated with high levels of caregiving burden and impaired quality of life (QoL); however, parents can also experience uplifts which, by facilitating the attribution of positive meanings to caregiving, may contribute to better adaptation outcomes. The present study aimed at examining the direct and indirect links, via positive reframing as a coping strategy, between caregiving uplifts and quality of life (QoL) of parents who have a child/adolescent with asthma, as well as the invariance of the mediation model across children’s age groups and asthma severity levels. A total of 180 parents of children/adolescents aged 8-18 reported their experience of caregiving uplifts (Revised Burden Measure), the use of positive reframing coping (Brief Cope) and their QoL (WHOQOL-Bref). Structural equation modeling showed a good fit for the mediation model (χ2/df=1.74, CFI=.95, RMSEA=.06), which explained 14% of the variability of parents’ QoL. The caregiving uplifts were positively associated with positive reframing coping (β=.19, p=.02), which in turn was positively associated with QoL (β=.36, p<.01). No direct effect of uplifts on parents’ QoL was found, but the indirect effect via positive reframing coping was statistically significant (β=.07, BC95%CI=.01/.14). Multi-group analyses demonstrated the strong structural invariance of the model across age groups (Δχ2=.89, p=.35) and asthma severity levels (Δχ2=1.91, p=.17). These results suggest that psychological interventions focused on recognizing and valuing caregiving uplifts and on positive reappraisal of the stressful situation may support more adaptive coping processes and improve parents’ QoL.