Coping, Stress, and Learning

Handicapped young children, because of their vulnerability, usually have less adaptive behaviors to cope with the stresses of daily living. This article defines and describes coping and stress, their relationship to learning, and how they are assessed for educational planning for preschool handicapped children. The Coping Inventory, an observation assessment instrument, is used to show how the teaching and leaming of coping behavior can be part of each child’s educational plan.. From birth, handicapped children have greater difficulty stabilizing and developing habitual behaviors to cope adaptively with the daily demands of their environment (Brazelton, 1973). Because of their vulnera-bility, these children, who need to have the most adaptive behaviors, generally have the least. As a result, they experience the envi-ronment as more stressful. The challenge for the 1980’s is to help them to learn more effec-tive coping behaviors. This article defines and describes coping and stress, their relationship to learning, and how they are assessed for educational plan-ning. The Coping Inventory, an observation assessment instrument, is used to show how the teaching and learning of adaptive coping behavior can be part of each child’s educa-tional plan. Research with the Coping Inven-tory is used to describe differences in coping behavior between handicapped and non-handicapped children aged 3 to 5 years. COPING BEIIAYIOIt Most of the research relating to coping and stress has been concerned with adults in either atypical stressful circumstance