Speaker Biography

Janardhana Navaneedham

NIMHANS, India

Title: Parenting a child with learning disability and their sibling: Between Joy and Sorrow

Janardhana Navaneedham
Biography:

Abstract:

Background and the objective: Learning disability is a disorder in which basic psychological process involved in understanding or using language, may manifest itself in an imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, and spell or to do mathematical calculations. Parents, who are unaware about this, may consider their child to be lazy and disinterested. This study is an attempt to understand the experiences of parents in bringing up a child with learning disability.  Methodology: An exploratory research design with qualitative approach was employed to fulfill the objective of the study. An interview guide was developed, and content validated by 5 experts. Five parents were interviewed for the study. Data was analyzed using Interpretative phenomenological analysis. Results: The analysis brought out the first hand understanding and experiences of parents. The sub themes were: Identification of early problems, academic difficulties, misconceptions lingering around the problem, emotional and behavioral difficulties, and children creating discrepancy by being intelligent in other aspects  Conclusion: Parents understanding about a child is manifested in different ways while some understood it as a problem; others assume that their child is lazy. Parents also has questions about their child being intelligent and yet unable to study. While parents are trying to understand their child, they battle out many difficulties and questions that come their way.

Keywords: Disability, Parenting, Children with learning disability