Abstract

The term "Co-Parenting" relates to the way in which adults, who share parental responsibility, work as one unit for the child's benefit. Effective co-parenting is characterized by cooperation, support, involvement and commitment as well as a low level of conflict within the parental dyad. Parents who co-parent demonstrate a higher level of emotional well-being and suffer fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety. These kinds of relationships, which are characterized by mutual acceptance and support, are liable to strengthen the parent's feelings of efficiency and capability, while coping with the challenges of raising children. They also, apparently, make up part of the components of the relationship between co-parenting and emotional well-being.

The current study sought to examine this connection among parents of autistic children. The study's assumption was that even among this population, there would be a positive relationship between co-parenting and emotional well-being demonstrated by parents. Therefore, the higher the quality of their co-parenting, the fewer signs of emotional distress they would demonstrate. In other words, the processes connected to parenting were expected to be similar to those occurring in normative families, even when the child has special needs. The study's hypothesis was tested while analyzing the contribution of the parents' gender to the proposed link between the variables.

The study's participants were eighty children, aged three to five years old, and their parents. Co-parenting was evaluated using a questionnaire for self-reporting (CRS, Feinberg et al., 2012) and by observing three dialogues that the parents were requested to conduct between them about the child. The observational index was designed for the current study, emphasizing the extent that parental conversation was characterized by openness, involvement and affirmation compared to the extent it was characterized by defensiveness, competitiveness and hostility. The parent's emotional well-being was evaluated using a self-reporting questionnaire (BSI; Derogatis & Melisaratos, 1983).

The study's assumption was partially proven: In accordance with the hypothesis, there was a negative correlation between co-parenting reported by mothers and the psychological distress that they demonstrated so that the more effective the co-parenting, the less psychological distress was exhibited. The same negative correlation was found among fathers between reported co-parenting and demonstrated psychological distress. Therefore, the better the co-parenting was reported to be, the lesser the psychological distress reported. However, no connection was found between the observed co-parenting and the psychological distress either of the mothers or of the fathers.

The study's findings enrich the knowledge and understanding of the co-parenting relationship among parents of autistic children and the connection between that relationship and the psychological distress that they experience. In addition, the study's findings form a basis of developing interventions to improve co-parenting which would likely contribute to the improved well-being of the parents and, it seems, also to an improved relationship with their children and in other areas of their lives. Also, therapeutic interventions with parents of children on the autistic spectrum, which would improve their mental state, are likely to improve the co-parenting relationship and help parents to be cooperative, support each other, be jointly involved and committed, and to demonstrate a lower level of conflict in the parental dyad.