Comparison of general health, coping styles, religious orientations, and personality dimensions of mothers with intellectual disability and of mothers with normal children

The purpose of this study was to compare general health, coping styles, religious orientations, and personality dimensions of mothers with intellectually disable (ID) and normal children. A total of 258 mothers were randomly selected. The data were collected using questionnaires of General Health, NEO Five Factors, Islamic Religiosity, and Ways of Coping. Then, the independent-sample T test was run to analyze the results.  Comparison of the participants' mean scores showed that the general health of mothers with ID children was lower than mothers with normal children. Compared to mothers with normal children, mothers with ID children used emotional focus coping styles more frequently. However, no significant difference was observed between the two groups with regard to application of problem focus coping style. Mothers of ID children were more disorganized than mothers with normal children. Comparison of the mean scores of personality dimensions between the two groups revealed that mothers of ID children had higher scores in neuroticism and lower scores in extraversion, openness, agreeable, and consciousness. With respect to the numerous problems that mothers of children with ID experience, it seems necessary to take actions to solve their problems and to improve their health status.