Patterns of Psycho-Social Problems and Coping Strategies of Students with Visual Impairment
Loading...
Date
2021
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
UMT, Lahore
Abstract
Visual impairment (VI) is the third leading impairment that affected more than 2.2 billion persons worldwide and impedes their psychosocial and emotional functioning. The degree to which these problems affect individuals‘ physical, psychological and social wellbeing depends, in part, on one‘s coping resources and strategies. The study had two aims. Firstly, to measure the patterns of psychosocial problems and coping strategies of students with VI. Secondly, to demonstrate the association between psychosocial problems, coping strategies, and key demographic variables. Mixed methods research design was employed to assemble data. The study comprised five different phases, in early phases, phenomenology was explored by 35 university students with VI (20 men and 15 women) ranging from 18 to 26 years of age (M=21.29±2.65), to develop the initial pool of items for the construction of Psychosocial Problem Scale and Coping Strategies Scale. Expert validation was sought and both scales were pilot tested on 10 participants (5 men and 5 women). Lastly, psychometric properties of the newly developed indigenous scales were established and hypotheses were tested using a sample of 559(Men 61% and Women 39%) students who were either congenitally (76%) visually impaired or had acquired the condition (24%). The age of the participants ranged from 16-28 (M= 20.34, SD = 3.48) years.