Prosocial vs antisocial coping and general life satisfaction of youth with mild intellectual disability

The purpose of this study was to find differences in general life satisfaction in adolescents with mild intellectual disability (MID) with respect to exhibiting a prosocial or an antisocial coping style. According to the ecological approach, using the antisocial style in a competitive school environment (a zero-sum game) may increase personal satisfaction, while in the family, which operates on the principles of 'common good' or 'common failure' (a non-zero-sum game), the antisocial style may reduce general satisfaction of the individual. However, according to the self-regulatory approach, antisocial coping in interactions with parents and teachers in adolescence may increase life satisfaction as it heightens the individual's sense of autonomy. The differences between the two approaches in the hypothesised influence of a particular coping style on life satisfaction led us to conduct empirical research.

A total of 151 students with MID were qualified for the final study (75 females and 76 males). The age of the examined group varied from 18 to 22 years. The study was conducted using the R-PDPI test, which is based on the Strategic Approach to Coping Scale by Hobfoll (). The test measures coping with domination and humiliation from parents and teachers as well as isolation and humiliation from peers (Kurtek ). Next, the Index of General Affect by Campbell et al. () was used to assess general life satisfaction.

Generally, a positive relationship between the indirect prosocial style and life satisfaction was found. Also, the results indicate that using the prosocial coping style to deal with humiliating acts of the mother and dominant acts of the father was connected with increased general life satisfaction, whereas the antisocial coping style employed in these situations - with a lower level of satisfaction. Moreover, it was found that general life satisfaction was positively related to passive and suppressive coping styles but negatively correlated with the antisocial coping style in situations of isolation and humiliation from peers. The paper ends with the discussion and interpretation of the results.