Chapter 2

THE PHILOSOPHICAL WORLDVIEW ASSUMSTION

This chapter present the philosophical assumption to be used in this study. The study reveals the

phenomenological experiences of a parent with down syndrome child.

Ontology is define as a “formal, explicit specification of a shared conceptualization

(Studer 1998),” typically involving classes, their relations, and axioms to clarify the intended

semantics. In this contribution, the InterCape model is a formal ontology that supports

integration modeling platform as practiced in process modeling, simulation, optimization and

planning. The ontology is employed to form a basis to encapsulate compressive knowledge on

process modeling in the domain of boirefining by considering implicit knowledge of the

modelers’ intuition and experiences, then translating into a form of explicit knowledge. By

instantiating the ontological concepts of process modeling and simulation, the knowledge

regarding the model is stored in the semantic repository. The captured knowledge of process

modeling is searchable for sharing, which further promotes reusability of the existing models, an

informed decision in selection of the model to be integrated.

In our study the reason why it is called a ontology it is because we want to know the

perspective of the parent with down syndrome children. According to Richards (2003) ontology

is the assumptions we make about the kind and nature of reality and what exists. Snape and

Spencer (2003) also define ontology as the nature if the world and what we can know about it.

The importance of ontology is to help the researchers recognize how certain they can be about

the nature and existence of objects they are researching. (March 23, 2018).
 On being told their newborn baby has an impairment, parents tend to react with a mixture

of shock and disbelief, followed by denial (Zappella, 2016). As the reality becomes undeniable,

feelings of guilt, fear of the reactions of others, and uncertainty regarding the future emerge

(Fortier and Wanlass, 1984; Mulcahy and Savage, 2016). Torn between powerful and conflicting

emotions, parents live through a stressful period in which coping depends on support groups, and

skilled professionals (Yildrim, et al., 2012). Some studies have found more positive sentiments

slowly emerging. Parents may come to see caring for a child with a chronic disability as giving

meaning and purpose to their lives: a source of self–actualization and fulfillment (Schwartz,

2003).

Ontology refers to what sort of things exist in the social world and assumptions about the

form and nature of that social reality. It is concerned with whether or not social reality exists

independently of human of human understanding and interpretation; for instance, is there a

shared social reality or ‘mutiple context–specific realities’. Broadly speaking, three distinct

ontological positions identified are realism, idealism and materialism (Snaoe & Spencer 2003).

Realism claims that there is an external reality independent of what people may think or

understand it to be, whereas, idealism maintains that reality can only be understood via the

human mind and socially constructed meanings. Similar to realism, materialism also claims that

there is a real world but it is only the material or physical world that is considered to be real.

Other phenomena, for instance, beliefs, values or experiences arise from the material world but

do not shape it. Ontological approach ensures the future retrieval and effective reuse of models

and/or data, which can be coupled with the user’s expertise to identify the best suited models

and/or data for their integration. (Koo & Cecelja 2015; Koo et al. 2016). (Moon and Blackman

2014) The first branch is being’, which is concerned with what actually exists in the world about
which humans can acquire knowledge. Ontology helps researchers recognize how certain they

can be about the nature and existence of objects they are researching. For instance, what ‘truth

claims’ can a researcher make about reality? Who decides the legitimacy of what is ‘real”? How

do researchers deal with different and conflicting ideas of reality?

The researcher used ontology because it deals with a beliefs about reality. It focuses on

the experiences of parent with down syndrome child. It also focuses on the following questions

1.How do you take care of them everyday?

2. What are the struggles you encounter while raising them?

3. How do you handle that struggles?