Introduction: Expressed emotion has been used as a measure of the relationship between parents and children. This study aimed to compare expressed emotion among mothers and finally of children with and without autism and to investigate the factors influence it among them.
Method: The Embedded Design Mixed Research Method was used to assess the quantity of mothers expressed emotion. The study population consisted of 50 mothers of the children with autism that their children ages were between 3-13 years were selected non-randomly and 50 mothers of children with normal growth at the same age were selected randomly. At the second phase, qualitative research method was used to examine the factors influenced mothers expressed emotions.
Results: The mothers of the children with autism had higher score both in the total score of expressed emotion, and emotional over-involvement (EQI) and criticism. In addition, five factors influenced the mothers of the children with autism to be of high expressed emotion that were "being worried about others comment", "being worried about the child's future", "just paying attention to child's needs and ignoring their own and other family member’s needs", "comparing their child with other children", and "blaming and criticizing the child".
Conclusion: According to the results, it is recommended that in rehabilitation of children with autism, intervention procedures that consider parents expressed emotion should be developed as well.
Keywords: Mixed research method, Expressed emotion, Autism, Mother
