آثار جائحة كورونا في الصحة النفسية لدى الطلبة العمانيين ذوي صعوبات التعلم من وجهة نظر أولياء أمورهم
This study aimed to identify the impacts of the Coronavirus pandemic on the mental health of Omani students with learning disabilities (SLDs) from the perspective of their parents. The study sample consisted of 288 males and female SLDs. These students were enrolled in the learning disabilities program in first-cycle schools at Muscat Governorate, Oman. This study followed the mixed methods research (quantitative and qualitative). In the quantitative research, parents of SLDs responded to the mental health scale, which consisted of 27 items distributed to four domains related to sleep disorders, depression, fear, and anxiety. The results indicated that the impacts of the Coronavirus pandemic on the mental health of SLDs came at an average level on all domains of the scale. There were statistically significant differences according to the gender in favor of females. The results also showed that there were no statistically significant differences due to the category of learning disabilities. In qualitative research, personal interviews were conducted with 10 mothers of SLDs. The results of qualitative data analysis showed that there were psychological impacts of the Coronavirus on SLDs. These results were consistent with the results of the quantitative data. The study recommended designing counseling programs to reduce the impacts of the Coronavirus on SLDs and conducting a review of literature to identify the impacts of the pandemic on SLDs in Arab society. (Author’s abstract)