1. Objectifs

Intentions :
«Particularly studied are the adaptive process of the parents of a child with a defect, and the development of an early intervention program for the families.» (p. 408)

2. Méthode

Échantillon/Matériau :
«Ten parents were recruited from Montreal area hospitals; all were French- Canadian and of average socioeconomic status. The five couples had been living together for 2 to 6 years and had a child with a physical defect.» (p. 409)

Instruments :
- Guides d’entretien semi-directifs
- Questionnaire

Type de traitement des données :
Analyse de contenu

3. Résumé

«This study has presented an examination of the adaptive process of parents after the birth of a child with a defect, the development of an early-stage intervention program for the parents, and the demonstration that the entire family system is affected by the stress and requires specific attention. The study also underlines the importance of intervention in the individual subsystem and its repercussions on the other systems. The advantages of an intervention program for both parents are clear: it helps promote mutual support and helps them relinquish the dream of an ideal child and adapt to the child they have brought into the world. […] It is important to emphasize that the proposed program is crisis intervention, a short-term program limited to the parents’ needs for psychological help. At times, the parents manifested a need for concrete help and for precise guidelines concerning the special care of their child, none of which was part of the program. In this sense, the intervention program did not answer all the parents’ needs. Ideally, it should be administered by a multidisciplinary team that would include parents of children with a defect.» (p. 420)