How Does the Subjective Care Burden of Mothers Affect Life Satisfaction of Children with Developmental Disabilities? : The Mediating Roles of Mother's Leisure Satisfaction and Depression

Background and Purpose: Individuals with developmental disabilities face challenges in maintaining independent lives and often require extensive assistance from caregivers to maintain daily routines. In Korean society, where traditional family concepts are strongly embedded, the responsibility for caring for people with developmental disabilities primarily falls on the family, particularly the mothers. This heightened caregiving burden can have a detrimental impact on leisure satisfaction, which is a crucial factor in mental health outcomes. According to the integrative model for the transmission of risk to children of depressed mothers, mothers’ depression can impact their children’s well-being. This mechanism could be even more explicit when mothers have an additional care burden from their child’s disabilities. However, the extent of the caregiving burden of mothers and its impact on individuals with developmental disabilities has not been thoroughly examined. This study aimed to examine the mediating roles of mother’s leisure satisfaction and depression between the subjective care burden of mothers and the life satisfaction of children with developmental disabilities.

Methods: A total of 260 cases of mothers and children with developmental disabilities were derived from the 2020 Disability and Life Dynamics Panel of Korea Disabled people’s Developmental Institute. Structural equation modeling was conducted to test the structural relationship between the variables: mother’s care burden, leisure satisfaction, depression, and child’s life satisfaction; bootstrapping method was conducted to test statistical significance of indirect effects. Mother’s age, marriage status, employment status, subjective health, child’s age, sex, type of disability, logged household monthly income, and whether mothers have a social support to ask help regarding child’s disability were controlled.

Results: The estimated indices of overall goodness-of-fit for the structural model were χ2=104.863(df=69, p<.01), CFI=.966, RMSEA=.045(90% C.I. = .026~.061), and SRMR=.028. This indicates that the model of the current study was acceptable for estimating the parameters. Total effect was significant (B=-.542, 95% C.I. = -.842~-.185). While mothers’ subjective care burden was not directly associated with child’s life satisfaction, the total indirect effect was significant (B=-.250, 95% C.I. = -.397~-.118). Specifically, both mothers’ leisure satisfaction (B=-.095, 95% C.I. = -.207~-.016) and depression (B=-.116, 95% C.I. = -.243~-.016) respectively mediated the relationship between mothers’ subjective care burden and child’s life satisfaction. Furthermore, the indirect effect of maternal care burden on child’s life satisfaction through the sequence of mothers’ leisure satisfaction and mothers’ depression was significant (B=-.040, 95% C.I.=-.093~-.012).

Conclusion and Implications: The present study shows that the subjective caregiving burden experienced by mothers has a considerable influence on the life satisfaction of their children with developmental disabilities, mediated by the mothers' levels of leisure satisfaction and depression. These findings emphasize the importance of extending support to mothers to alleviate their depression by promoting leisure satisfaction. Significantly, interventions targeting maternal leisure satisfaction have the potential to improve the well-being of both caregivers and their children with developmental disabilities. The results provides implications for healthcare practitioners and policymakers prioritize the provision of leisure services for mothers of children with developmental disabilities to promote their psychological well-being.