Psychosocial Adjustment in Emerging Adults With and Without Spina Bifida: A 14-Year Follow-up Study.
Grayson N Holmbeck, Tessa K Kritikos
PMID 34016827WHAT IT FOUND
At 22-23 years, emerging adults with spina bifida were less likely to be married, dating, working or studying, and had fewer friends and family supports, but reported similar emotional symptoms and relationship quality.
Key findings
01At ages 22 to 23, 9% of young adults with spina bifida were married or living with a significant other, compared with 27% of comparison young adults.
02Young adults with spina bifida were less likely to be in college or employed (68%) than comparison young adults (87%).
03Young adults with spina bifida reported symptom levels similar to comparison young adults on all eight Adult Self-Report scales and on body image.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
The Time 7 outcomes were all self-report from the young adults, so they do not show what parents, clinicians, or records would report. The analysis used relatively small groups, 56 spina bifida families and 62 comparison families, and many comparisons were made, so some findings may be less reliable. The sample was mostly White and included very few Latino/a families, limiting generalizability. Although the study followed participants across seven waves, the reported analyses compared groups at one time point and did not examine change over time. The study did not test why the groups differed. The verbal IQ proxy was receptive vocabulary, which may be a weak representation of IQ, and controlling it removed some group differences. Attrition occurred between the first and seventh waves, though participants and nonparticipants did not differ on several demographics and medical variables.
Declared interests
The article lists research support from NIH extramural and non-U.S. government sources. It does not report author conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read these group differences as evidence that any treatment or rehabilitation programme caused or prevented them. The study is observational, did not test explanatory variables, and some differences, including education and friendship diffusion, were not significant after controlling for the verbal IQ proxy.