Interpersonal conflicts in married peoples who were required to take care of an elderly parent (a qualititative study)

This survey aims to identify interpersonal conflicts of the married people obliged to take care of their old parents.

This survey was conducted by adopting qualitative method and phenomenological approach. Participants of this survey were married people with children who lived in Qom City during 2016 and took care of their old parents. The statistical sample includes 13 individuals (n=8 female and n=5 male) selected through objective sampling method. The size was determined through saturation principle. Data collection was done through semi-structured interview and analysis of collected data was done based on Collaizi's seven-step method. The method includes a range of steps from reading interview transcriptions to validation of findings.
Findings: The interpersonal conflicts that participants experienced were categorized into four classes namely sibling's conflicts (disagreement and maladjustment), marital conflicts (marital deprivations, maladjustment, promotion of bad moods and tripartite conflicts), parent-child conflict (low attention to children, maladjustment, problems of young children, tripartite conflict), and child-parent conflicts (enmeshment, maladjustment).

Findings of present survey suggest that caring after old parent(s) by their adult children may contribute to certain interpersonal conflicts between such adults and their own children. However, comparison of current findings with conclusions of previous surveys suggest that this issue is not an absolute as other factors such as socioeconomic status, familial condition, parent’s previous attention to his/her child, and children’s normal and motivational beliefs affect the event.