Relationships Between Differences in Mother-Father Perceptions and Self-Concept and Depression in Children With Epilepsy

The purpose of this study was to explore relationships between differences in perceptions of mothers and fathers and self-concept and symptoms of depression, respectively, in 69 youth with epilepsy. Multiple regression was used to test whether the absolute difference scores between mothers’ and fathers’ perceptions of family adaptive resources, stigma, their children’s negative coping behaviors, and their attitudes toward epilepsy were predictors of child self-concept and depression after adjusting for epilepsy severity, children’s attitudes toward epilepsy, and children’s ratings of family adaptation. Only the mother-father differences related to children’s negative coping behaviors significantly predicted children’s self-concept and depressive symptoms. Findings suggest that differences in perceptions related to children may be more highly associated with the children’s outcomes than differences related to family characteristics or the children’s illness.