Prevalence Of Psychosocial Health Issues Among The Parents Of Children With Special Needs: An Exploratory Study From Assam

Abstract

Child with special needs is one of the most vulnerable sections of the society. Many studies already have discussed the issues encountered by parents of special child around the world; however, there is scanty of research in the field form psychological perspective in Assam, the northeastern state of India. Therefore, the present study has been conducted in order to fill this gap. The objectives of this study is to identify the challenges encountered by parents of special child in their day to day life as well as during the situation of death toll created by COVID 19 outbreak and to understand the need for counseling service and special education program for the specially-abled children as perceived by their parents. The study is based on primary data collected from 28 participants who are parents of a special child belonging to Darrang district of Assam. In order to gather the data, convenience sampling technique, semi structured interview method, focus group discussion etc. have been used. The study has found that parents of children with special needs encounter different psychosocial problems such as physical exhaustion, financial issues, emotional trauma, social stigma, time constraints, worrying about future etc.