Does attachment between staff and people with ID impact staff empathy?
Research type
Research Study
Full title
How does the attachment relationship between individuals with intellectual disability and challenging behaviour and support staff impact on staff empathy?
IRAS ID
260862
Contact name
Dougal Hare
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Cardiff University
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 3 months, 28 days
Research summary
Research results suggest that people with intellectual disabilities (ID) have more difficult relationships than the general population. The rate of difficult relationships for people with ID is higher if that person also displays challenging behaviour (CB), such as physical or verbal aggression, property destruction, or self-injury. People with ID are often supported by support staff, and so develop relationships with their staff. Difficult relationships between people with ID and their staff have been shown to impact upon staff empathy and therefore affect how well the staff can understand how the person with ID is feeling. CB is likely to impact upon this further.
This research aims to address the primary question of whether it is possible to predict a staff member’s level of empathy based on relationship behaviour demonstrated towards them by the person they support who displays CB. It will also address the secondary aims of identifying whether this is influenced by CB, the type of relationship between the staff member and person with ID and CB, empathy and the incorporation of the five conditions of security (Skelly, 2016) in the person with ID’s support.
People with ID and their support staff within specialist challenging behaviour services will be recruited for this study. Support staff will be required to complete 6 questionnaires. This should take no longer than 1 hour. Participants with ID will be required to complete 2 questionnaires, with support from the Principal Investigator (PI). This should take approximately 30 minutes.
REC name
West Midlands - Coventry & Warwickshire Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
19/WM/0216
Date of REC Opinion
4 Oct 2019
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion