The Stress of Autism

This is an excerpt from an article originally published on July 14, 2009 in the New York Times:

Raising a child with any developmental disability or behavior problem is difficult. But is there something uniquely stressful about autism? That is the question researchers at the University of Washington Autism Center tried to answer in a study of mothers of children with developmental disabilities.

I spoke with Annette Estes, associate director of the center, about the research and how it might make a difference for parents of children with autism. Here’s our conversation.

Q Isn’t it obvious that having a child with autism would be stressful for parents?

A What we were interested in is the evidence that is starting to come out that parents of children with autism were reporting higher levels of stress than parents of children with developmental delays. We know parents who have children with any kind of disability have more requirements and more demands on them than parents of typically developing children. We wanted to better understand what was making the added difference for parents of children with autism.

For the full interview and article go to The Stress of Autism.