Relationship between mother- child interaction and symptoms of anxiety disorders in deaf and hard-of-hearing children

The purpose of the current study was to examine the relationship between mother- child relationship and symptoms of anxiety disorders in deaf and hard-of-hearing children. The research method was correlation analysis. From among the mothers of children with hearing problems in Brojerd, Malayer, Toyserkan and Nahavand, 69 mothers (36 mothers of deaf and 33 mothers of hard-of- hearing) participated in study uusing census method. The Spence's Children Anxiety Scale-Parent Version (1992) and Child-Parent Relationship Scale (1998) were used for data collection and Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA), Pearson correlation coefficient and stepwise regression was used for data analysis. Results indicated that 15.15% of deaf children, and 8.33% of hard-of-hearing children had symptoms of anxiety disorders. Results of MANOVA indicated that symptoms of anxiety disorders and dimensions of mother-child relationship didn’t differ between deaf and hard-f-hearing children; but social anxiety in hard-of-hearing children and fear of physical injury in deaf children were higher. Results of Pierson correlation coefficient showed that the closeness of mother-child relationship was negatively and conflict in mother-child relationship was positively correlated with anxiety disorders. According to regression analysis, the closeness of mother-child relationship negatively predicted symptoms of anxiety disorders. According to the results, teaching mother-child relationship to mothers of children with hearing problems is suggested to decrease the symptoms of anxiety disorders among these children.