CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 58Family and Disability Support ResearchAutism Spectrum Disorder ResearchFamily Caregiving in Mental Illness

The association of illness perceptions with depressive symptoms and general psychological distress in parents of an offspring with autism spectrum disorder.

Gatzoyia, Dimitra, Kotsis, Konstantinos, Koullourou, Iouliani, Goulia, Panagiota, Carvalho, André F., Soulis, Spyros, Hyphantis, Thomas·2014·Disability and health journal
DOI 10.1016/j.dhjo.2013.10.008
Open this paper in CoChat — free account

Abstract

Background Raising a child with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a severe stressor and parents often present high levels of depression. Depression is associated with illness perceptions but this association has not been studied in parents of ASD offspring.Objective We aimed to assess the prevalence of psychological distress symptoms and their associations with illness perceptions in parents with an ASD offspring.Methods In 111 parents of ASD offspring we assessed depressive symptoms (PHQ-9), illness perceptions (B-IPQ) and general psychological distress (GHQ-28). Multiple linear and logistic regressions were used to assess their independent associations.Results The prevalence of parental clinically significant depressive symptoms was 34.2%, while 55% presented clinically significant levels of general psychological distress. Younger parents and those with lower financial resources had greater psychological distress and more severe depressive symptoms. Parents felt that the condition impacted their lives and believed it would be chronic. Their beliefs about the consequences and the chronicity of the disorder were significant independent correlates of their psychological distress and depressive symptoms severity.Conclusions These findings indicate that a remarkable proportion of parents with an ASD offspring present clinically significant depressive symptoms, which were associated with illness perceptions relevant to the consequences and the chronicity of the disorder. Our data encourage psychotherapeutic interventions aiming to support parents to deal with the consequences and chronicity of their offspring's disorder, in order to reduce parental psychological distress.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1016/j.dhjo.2013.10.008

Cites

53 of 53 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Claims the paper makes

This paper’s full text isn’t openly available, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Parents of children with ASD often experience heavy psychological and caregiving burdens, with cross-sectional studies reporting parental stress prevalence rates ranging from 37% to 80% across various countries.

    “Parents of children with ASD often experience heavy psychological and caregiving burdens, with cross-sectional studies reporting parental stress prevalence rates ranging from 37% to 80% across various countries.”

    From Acceptance and Commitment Training for Parents of Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder (2026) · cites this paper as [8]

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

1 of the 54 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Gatzoyia, D., Kotsis, K., Koullourou, I., Goulia, P., Carvalho, A. F., Soulis, S., & Hyphantis, T.
Affiliations
University of Ioannina (GR)
Corresponding author
Hyphantis, Thomas
ORCID
Venue
Disability and health journal
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2014-04
Volume
7
Issue
2
Pages
173-180
ISSN
  • 1876-7583 (ISSN-L)
  • 1936-6574
DOI
10.1016/j.dhjo.2013.10.008
OpenAlex
W2135847186
Cited by
58
References
54
Citations by year
2026: 4 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 10 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 7 · 2018: 2 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 2 · 2015: 3 · 2014: 2
FWCI
2.59
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Licence
www.elsevier.com/tdm/userlicense/1.0/ (tdm)
Locations
  • Disability and health journal (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Family and Disability Support Research
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Autism Spectrum Disorder Research
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Family Caregiving in Mental Illness
Keywords
autism spectrum disorder, parental depression, depressive symptoms, illness perception, psychological distress, parents of autistic children, financial resources, parental age
MeSH terms
Autism Spectrum Disorder, Adolescent, Age Factors, Attitude to Health, Cross-Sectional Studies, Depression, Female, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Parents, Psychiatric Status Rating Scales, Surveys and Questionnaires, Risk Factors, Sex Factors, Stress, Psychological

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review