The Relationship between Anxiety Symptoms and Perceived Quality of Life among Caregivers of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder in the Amazon

Rayanne Vieira da Silva, Manuela Maria de Lima Carvalhal and Daniela Lopes Gomes ()
Additional contact information
Rayanne Vieira da Silva: Nucleus of Behavior Theory Research, Federal University of Pará, Belém 66087-110, Brazil
Manuela Maria de Lima Carvalhal: Institute of Health Sciences, Federal University of Pará, Belém 66075-110, Brazil
Daniela Lopes Gomes: Nucleus of Behavior Theory Research, Federal University of Pará, Belém 66087-110, Brazil

IJERPH, 2024, vol. 21, issue 5, 1-10

Abstract: The relationship between anxiety symptoms and perceived quality of life among caregivers of children with autism was verified. To assess perceived quality of life, the Short Form Healthy Survey Item was used; perception of anxiety symptoms was assessed using the Beck Anxiety Inventory. Eighty caregivers of children with autism participated, with 68.7% of caregivers being mothers. Of the total number of caregivers, 68.8% had a severe level of anxiety. Regarding perceived quality of life, they demonstrated greater impairment in limitation due to physical aspects, limitation due to emotional aspects, vitality, and pain. Caregivers with severe anxiety levels had a worse quality of life in the domains of pain ( p = 0.012), social aspects ( p < 0.001), limitation due to emotional aspects ( p = 0.001), and mental health ( p < 0.001). However, in the functional capacity domain, caregivers with a moderate level of anxiety had a better physical capacity score ( p = 0.001). There was a negative correlation between the general anxiety score and the general physical ( p = 0.029) and general emotional components of perceived quality of life ( p < 0.001). It was found that caregivers of children with ASD have a high level of anxiety, which is a predictor of the perception of a worse quality of life.

Keywords: quality of life; anxiety; autism; caregivers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/21/5/545/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/21/5/545/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:21:y:2024:i:5:p:545-:d:1383160

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().