Abstract
The aim of the study was to find outwhether, and if so, to what extent, personal resources of family members (their life satisfactionand sense of coherence), as well as internal resourcesof the family system (perceived strong points of thefamily) differentiate between families with eithera healthy or mentally ill adult child. Subjects in thestudy were 124 non-clinical families living in Warsaw,and 40 families with an adult schizophrenicchild treated in the III Department of Psychiatry,Institute of Psychiatry and Neurology. Using questionnairetechniques it was found that life satisfactionof schizophrenic children and their parents wassignificantly lower than that in healthy families.Global sense of coherence of schizophrenic children as compared to their healthy peers was significantlylower. Family resources perceived by family memberswere lower in families with a schizophrenicadult child than these in healthy families. Parentalsense of coherence level did not differentiate betweenthe two compared groups of families.