This study was an attempt to better understand the
antecedents of epileptic children's overdependency. To provide
a conceptual and empirical basis for investigation of
the problem, the general problem of overdependency in children
was examined in some detail. Then this general discussion
was applied to the specific problem of epileptic children's
overdependency. The following hypotheses were
developed for the study:
Overdependency in epileptic children will be:
1) directly related to the severity of the child's seizures;
2) inversely related to the age of onset of seizures; and 3)
directly related to the degree of maternal overrestrictiveness
and overprotectiveness.
To test these hypotheses, 40 8-11 year old female subjects
were randomly selected from the Seizure Unit of
Childrens Hospital Medical Center, Boston. To measure
instrumental dependency (ID) - i.e., the seeking out of
another individual as a means toward the attainment of some
other goal , e .g. , being fed - the Anchor Referral technique
(Mostofsky, 1972) was used . This is an interactional measure
whereby the subject is afforded an opportunity to ask t he
experimenter for help on a color comparison task . To measure
emotional dependency (ED) - i. e., the seeking out of another
individual as a goal in itself, e. g., for affection and
praise - the Children ' s Dependency Scale (Golightly, et al.,
1971) was employed. This is a 65- item self-report pencil-and-
paper measure developed for latency age children.
Maternal child-rearing attitudes were measured by the Parental
Attitude Research Instrument (Schaefer & Bell , 1958), a
110- item survey of a wide range of child-rearing attitudes.
Both seizure severity and frequency were measured by ad hoc
scales developed for the study; age of onset of seizures was
expressed in months .
Data analysis employed the Pearson r and chi-square.
Results were that none of the hypotheses was confirmed f or
the total sample . However , after breaking down the sample
into 2 Age Groups , a number of significant relationships
appeared following an exploratory look at the data . These
relationships are best summarized in terms of three patterns:
1) Age Group differences : Whereas both maternal
attitudes and seizure parameters were related to degree of
dependency among the older Ss, only seizure parameters were
so related in the younger group .
2) Significant relationships of different form or in
different direction from prediction: Maternal overrestrictiveness
and type and onset age of seizures covaried significantly
with dependency; however, relationships obtained were
either negative Pearson r's or chi-squares, as opposed to the
predicted positive Pearson r's.
3) ED-ID differences: ID was significantly related to
all of the independent variables (maternal attitudes,seizure
severity, onset age) in some way; ED was only related somewhat
to seizure parameters, and almost not at all to maternal
attitudes.
Results were discussed in terms of the variables hypothetically
antecedent to children's overdependency. Specifically,
two such variables - latency age counterdependency and
preadolescent sex-typing of dependency - seem to contribute
more to overdependency than do two of those variables which
were originally hypothesized to be major contributors (i.e.,
oral fixation and regression fostered by maternal child rearing
attitudes).
In the discussion it was also suggested that seizure
parameters, including onset age, type of seizures, and frequency
of seizures, do in fact influence the degree of epileptic
children's overdependency. However, the nature of
this influence is not as simple as was hypothesized. Each
parameter has a different effect, and each effect in turn is
influenced by the age of the individual. Further discussion
dealt with causative processes in emotional vs instrumental
dependency; implications of the study for further research;
and the clinical implications of the study.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bu.edu/oai:open.bu.edu:2144/46669 |
| Date | January 1975 |
| Creators | Meier, Robert M. |
| Publisher | Boston University |
| Source Sets | Boston University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
| Rights | This work is being made available in OpenBU by permission of its author, and is available for research purposes only. All rights are reserved to the author. |
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