An Investigation of the Self-Critical Tendencies, Self-Compassionate Practices, and Employed Coping Mechanisms in Mothers of Gifted Children

Ingstrup, Meghan Sinead

An Investigation of the Self-Critical Tendencies, Self-Compassionate Practices, and Employed Coping Mechanisms in Mothers of Gifted Children

dc.contributor.advisor	Mendaglio, Salvatore
dc.contributor.author	Ingstrup, Meghan Sinead
dc.contributor.committeemember	Zhao, Xu
dc.contributor.committeemember	Burns, Amy
dc.date	2021-11
dc.date.accessioned	2021-09-01T13:48:39Z
dc.date.available	2021-09-01T13:48:39Z
dc.date.issued	2021-08-26
dc.description.abstract	Many parents of gifted children have reported parenting challenges due to their child’s developmental trajectory which may result in difficult emotional responses. There has been little empirical insight provided into these experiences or how this population of parents is coping with these challenges. In order to gain a deeper understanding of these experiences, the purpose of this study was to investigate parenting challenges that mothers of gifted children experience, self-critical and self-compassionate responses to these challenges, and other coping mechanisms employed. Ten mothers of gifted children completed the Self-Compassion Scale (Neff, 2003b) and participated in semi-structured interviews. Data were analyzed using Thematic Analysis to identify shared parenting experiences (Braun & Clarke, 2006). The mothers reported a variety of parenting challenges that included: misconceptions of giftedness, covid-19, asynchronous development, and twice-exceptional abilities. These parenting challenges sometimes resulted in self-critical responses such as self-judgement, isolation, or over-identification (repetitive thought processes). However, mothers also reported experiences of self-compassion such as self- kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness in response to challenging parenting situations. Finally, mothers discussed receiving informal support from partners, family, and friends, in addition to formal support from teachers and mental health professionals as useful forms of external support. These findings provide insight into the parenting challenges mothers in this study experienced, in addition to self-critical and self-compassionate ways of coping with those challenges. Furthermore, mothers provided examples of external sources of support they found helpful. This study provided new insight into experiences of self-judgement, isolation, and over- identification, in addition to self-kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness in response to parenting challenges, which may be useful in future resource development for mothers of gifted children.	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Ingstrup, M. S. (2021). An Investigation of the Self-Critical Tendencies, Self-Compassionate Practices, and Employed Coping Mechanisms in Mothers of Gifted Children (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca.	en_US
dc.identifier.doi	http://dx.doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/39147
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/1880/113798
dc.language.iso	eng	en_US
dc.publisher.faculty	Werklund School of Education	en_US
dc.publisher.institution	University of Calgary	en
dc.rights	University of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission.	en_US
dc.subject	giftedness	en_US
dc.subject	self-compassion	en_US
dc.subject	parenting	en_US
dc.subject	coping	en_US
dc.subject.classification	Educational Psychology	en_US
dc.subject.classification	Education--Guidance and Counseling	en_US
dc.title	An Investigation of the Self-Critical Tendencies, Self-Compassionate Practices, and Employed Coping Mechanisms in Mothers of Gifted Children	en_US
dc.type	master thesis	en_US
thesis.degree.discipline	Education Graduate Program – Educational Psychology	en_US
thesis.degree.grantor	University of Calgary	en_US
thesis.degree.name	Master of Science (MSc)	en_US
ucalgary.item.requestcopy	true	en_US