Autism, in the manner of any chronic infantile disease, profoundly disturbs family life, generating a search for meaning. This qualitative study aims to explore the construction of interpretative models of the illness by Haitian parents of autistic children, living in Montreal. The results suggest that the majority of parents question the cause of their child's affliction and develop an assortment of meanings around this disease, allowing them to contain the feeling of absurdity that overwhelms them when confronted with their child's limitations. In spite of the fact that their experience is deep-rooted in a modern occidental world, the parents more often refer to traditional etiological conceptions of the disease, notably grounded either in humoral theories or in religious explanations, than in the so-called biomedical conceptions largely endorsed by North American clinicians. This study emphasizes the importance of acknowledging cultural representations and suggests tracks for future research.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.81439 |
| Date | January 2004 |
| Creators | Sigouin, Catherine |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | French |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (Department of Psychiatry.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 002166760, proquestno: AAIMR06454, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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