Maternal depression symptoms, child behavior problems, and their transactional relations: Probing the role of formal childcare

Abstract

Among children exposed to elevated maternal depression symptoms (MDS), recent studies have demonstrated reduced internalizing and externalizing problems for those who have attended formal childcare (i.e., center-based, family-based childcare). However, these studies did not consider whether childcare attendance is associated with benefits for the child only or also with reduced MDS. Using a four-wave longitudinal cross-lagged model, we evaluated whether formal childcare attendance was associated with MDS or child behavior problems and whether it moderated longitudinal associations between MDS and child behavior problems and between child behavior problems and MDS. The sample was drawn from a population-based cohort study and consisted of 908 biologically related mother–child dyads, followed from 5 months to 5 years. Attending formal childcare was not associated with MDS or child behavior problems but moderated the association between MDS at 3.5 years and child internalizing and externalizing problems at 5 years as well as between girls’ externalizing problems at 3.5 years and MDS at 5 years. No other moderation of formal childcare was found. Findings suggest that attending formal childcare reduces the risks of behavior problems in the context of MDS but also the risk of MDS in the context of girls’ externalizing problems.

Disturbing Dreams and Psychosocial Maladjustment in Children: A Prospective Study of the Moderating Role of Early Negative Emotionality

“…The scales (and mean Cronbach alpha across informants) included measures of both internalizing problems: anxiety (4 items, Mα = 0.72, e.g., being nervous, high-strung or tense), social withdrawal (3 items, Mα = 0.68, e.g., prefers to play alone rather than with other children), and emotional problems (3 items, Mα = 0.69, e.g., has trouble enjoying him or herself); and externalizing problems: opposition (3 items, Mα = 0.51, e.g., punishment doesn't change the child's behavior), physical aggression (4 items, Mα = 0.75, e.g., physically aggresses people), reactive aggression (4 items, Mα = 0.75, e.g., reacts aggressively when someone takes a personal belonging, for example by hitting, pushing, or slapping another child), proactive aggression (3 items, Mα = 0.55, e.g., scares other children to get what is wanted), indirect aggression (3 items, Mα = 0.69, e.g., when angry at someone, tries to get others to dislike the other person), and ADHD symptoms (7 items, Mα = 0.86, e.g., cannot settle on anything for more than a few moments; is impulsive/acts without thinking; is inattentive). These validated scales (89,91) have been shown to be sensitive to various environmental, familial, and perinatal risk and protective factors (95)(96)(97)(98)(99) as well as to early sleep patterns (100). The instrument was completed by the participants themselves at 11 years of age as well as by each child's father and teacher in order to get a complete description of their difficulties across the social context.…”

Joint effects of children’s emotional problems and parental depressive symptoms on the occurrence of internet gaming disorder among children and adolescents: A longitudinal study

“…Important risk factors for IGD among adolescents may involve familial and parental factors (Lam, 2015;Psychogiou et al, 2017). There are several empirical evidences on the problematic behavior in children and adolescents that have been associated with mental health problems in their parents (Burleigh, Stavropoulos, Liew, Adams, & Griffiths, 2018;Erceg et al, 2018;Loechner et al, 2020;Paquin et al, 2020). Especially parental depression plays a significant role in the development of IGD among children and adolescents (Choi, Chun, Lee, Han, & Park, 2018;Lam, 2015).…”

Pre-school childcare and inequalities in child development

“…Centre-based childcare may buffer against risk factors that are more prevalent among disadvantaged families. For example, childcare may reduce effects of maternal depression on children's internalising symptoms ( Paquin et al, 2019 ). However, childcare has also been associated with greater socio-emotional benefits for children from more advantaged families ( Gomajee et al, 2018 ), which is perhaps due to inequalities in the quality of care families receive.…”