Childhood experience, family support and parenting by people with intellectual disability

Parents with intellectual disability, like all other parents, are embedded in networks of capability-enhancing and/or capability-inhibiting relationships. This study investigated links between how parents with intellectual disability experienced their upbringing, continuity and discontinuity in familial relationships, and their assessments of their own parenting. Structured interviews, incorporating scales and open-ended questions, were conducted with 91 parents in receipt of specialist services for people with intellectual disability, including 82 mothers and 9 fathers. Most participants (81%) had experienced at least one form of childhood abuse or household adversity. Participants who recalled a more positive upbringing, including less adversity and more parental care, tended to have stronger support networks and reported greater parenting role satisfaction and emotional warmth in their interactions with their own children. The results highlight the need to understand parenting by people with intellectual disability in biographical and relational context.