Abstract
Globally, around 14% of adolescents between the ages of 10 and 19 are reported to face mental health issues. However, mild to moderate intellectual disabilities (MMID) are very prevalent among young people, affecting between 1 and 2% of this population. Most research has focused on risk factors associated with MMID in the Global North. There is a dearth of literature on resilience factors among adolescents diagnosed with MMID from the Global South, including South Africa. This study aimed to investigate the factors that enabled adolescents with MMID to be resilient.
A descriptive quantitative study investigating the resilience factors among adolescent learners diagnosed with MMID was conducted with 414 learners. The Child and Youth Resilience Measure (CYRM-28) was used to assess the prevailing resilience factors. The CYRM-28 consists of 28 questions to assess overall resilience. It is designed as a screening tool to explore the individual, relational, communal and cultural resources available to individuals which may bolster their resilience. Participants were conveniently selected from three schools that enrolled learners who had been diagnosed with MMID. The CYRM-28 questionnaire was administered with the support of qualified and trained school psychologists and teachers between August and September 2022. Data was descriptively analysed using SPSS.28 to get a picture of the prevailing resilience factors using scores, frequencies and percentages. Factor analysis was used to get the mean scores for the various factors and to establish how the participants scored in the various dimensions and sub-dimensions involved in the resilience measure. Independent t-tests were also used to investigate statistically significant differences between age, grade, race, gender and total resilience.
The factors that had the highest mean scores were Caregiver Physical Care with a mean score of 4.27 and Contextual Education with a mean score of 4.21. The factors that were in the middle were Contextual Cultural, which had a mean score of 3.97; Individual Social Skills, which had a mean score of 3.96; and Contextual Spiritual, which had a mean score of 3.87. The factors that had the lowest mean scores were Individual Peer Support with a mean score of 3.43, Individual Personal Skills with a mean score of 3,45 and Caregiver Psychological Care with a mean score of 3.69. The t-tests results showed no significant differences between gender, race, age, grade and total resilience.
The results show that in most of the CYRM-28 factors, the mean scores indicated that the items were 'somewhat' descriptive of the participants, suggesting the need for more attention in those areas to enable them to facilitate resilience for adolescents with MMID. In all analyses done, results indicated no statistically significant differences, which calls for any intervention to be equally focused on all adolescents regardless of their age, grade, race or gender.