Exploring the Subtypes of Intellectual and Psychological Characteristics in Children with Brain Tumors and Their Mothers' Parenting Stress

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: Parenting stress could be different among mothers of children with brain tumors. The aim of this study was to explore subtypes of children with brain tumor based on their intellectual and psychological characteristics and to compare the parenting stress of their mothers among the subtypes. METHODS: Latent profile analysis was conducted on the Verbal IQ, Performance IQ, and the scores of Social Problem, Internalization Behavior Problem, and Externalization Behavior Problem in a total of 90 children with brain tumors. Furthermore, the mothers' parenting stress was compared among the explored subtypes. RESULTS: Four-categorization appeared the best way to describe the intellectual and psychological presentation of the children with brain tumors and they are as follows; (1) Borderline Intelligence-Socially Maladjusted (B-SM 24.4%), (2) Average Intelligence-Internalization Behavior Problem (A-I 44.4%), (3) Average Intelligence-Normal Behavior (A-N 18.9%), and (4) Retarded Intelligence-Global Maladjusted (R-GM 12.2%). Mothers of R-GM group reported higher levels of stress on total domain and the subfactors of distractibility and adaptability of Korean Parenting Stress Index compared to mothers of A-N group, and the highest level of stress on spouse subfactor among the mothers of all subtypes. Mothers of subtypes with either intellectual or psychological problems showed higher level of stress on demandingness subfactor compared to mothers of A-N group. CONCLUSION: Eighty percents of children with brain tumor showed intellectual or psychological problems and the mothers of the children with both problems reported the highest parenting stress. The tailored services are needed to manage the parenting stress of mothers of children with brain tumors.