Testing the effects of COVID-19 confinement in Spanish children: The role of parents’ distress, emotional problems and specific parenting

Abstract

The COVID-19 outbreak has caused a great impact in our society. Because of its rapid spread, many countries, including Spain, were forced to impose drastic measures (i.e., restrictive lockdowns) to guarantee social distancing and isolation. In some countries, like Spain, these measures were particularly restrictive for children, who were forced to stay at home for more than 40 days, suffering a drastic change in their daily routines. The present study aimed to examine the effects of the Spanish confinement derived from the COVID-19 crisis on children and their families, accounting for child’s age. A range of child negative (e.g., conduct problems) and positive outcomes (e.g., routine maintenance) were examined, along with a set of parent-related variables, including resilience, perceived distress, emotional problems, parenting distress and specific parenting practices (e.g., structured or avoidant parenting), which were modeled through Path Analysis to better understand child adjustment. Data was collected in April 2020, through parent-reports, on a sample of 1,123 Spanish children (50% girls) aged three to 12 (Mage = 7.26; SD = 2.39). Results suggested that, according to parents’ information, most children did not show important changes in behavior, although some increase rates were observed for both negative and positive outcomes. Child adjustment was influenced by a chain of effects, derived from parents’ perceived distress and emotional response to the COVID-19 crisis, via parenting distress and specific parenting practices. While parenting distress particularly triggered child negative outcomes, specific parenting practices were more closely related to child positive outcomes. These findings may help to better inform, for potential future outbreaks, effective guidelines and prevention programs aimed at promoting child’s well-being in the family.

Distance learning, parent-child interactions, and affective well-being of parents and children during the COVID-19 pandemic: A daily diary study

“…Notably, the within-person effects of homeschooling and parental involvement therein on negative parent-child interactions and affective well-being emerged over and above the effects of general daily stressor occurrence, which significantly predicted more negative parent-child interactions, higher parental and child negative affect, and lower parental and child positive affect as well. Finding parental stress to be related to their own and their children's affective well-being on a daily basis supports previous work emphasizing the interrelations among parental and child functioning (Schermerhorn et al, 2010) and extends previous between-person research showing that parents' distress during crises spills over to their children (Chemtob et al, 2010;Eltanamly et al, 2019;Romero et al, 2020). On the between-person level, however, homeschooling per se was not associated with any of the outcomes, while stressor occurrence exhibited the same significant associations as on the within-person level.…”

“…Similarly, after the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, higher caregiver distress was associated with greater child posttraumatic stress (Kerns et al, 2014). In line with these findings, recent research examining the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on families revealed that parental distress was linked to negative child outcomes such as conduct problems, hyperactivity, and emotional problems (Romero et al, 2020).…”

“…Furthermore, the sample was positively selected (i.e., high education and high income), which is why the level of stress was possibly underestimated, as parents with lots of problems likely did not have time to complete the survey (see Romero et al, 2020). It further has to be considered that the present sample mainly consisted of women.…”

COVID-19 Life Events Spill-Over on Family Functioning and Adolescent Adjustment

“…Relying on prior work by Cummings and colleagues (Kouros et al, 2014;Zemp et al, 2017), Liu and Doan (2020) note that COVID-related stressors, such as those related to parents' work or children's online schooling, may "spillover" into family life, affecting marital, parent-child and sibling relationships. Emerging studies indeed show that greater parental stress is related to higher rates of symptomatology during the pandemic for children (Russell et al, 2020;Brown et al, 2020;Romero et al, 2020;Origlés et al, 2020) and that pre-existing child symptomatology predicted greater stress for families during the pandemic (Spinelli et al, 2020). For instance, children whose parents experience greater stress during the pandemic show greater changes in mood and behaviors (Orgilés et al, 2020;Romero et al, 2020) as well as increased stress and parent-child con ict (Russell et al, 2020;Spinelli et al, 2020).…”

“…Emerging studies indeed show that greater parental stress is related to higher rates of symptomatology during the pandemic for children (Russell et al, 2020;Brown et al, 2020;Romero et al, 2020;Origlés et al, 2020) and that pre-existing child symptomatology predicted greater stress for families during the pandemic (Spinelli et al, 2020). For instance, children whose parents experience greater stress during the pandemic show greater changes in mood and behaviors (Orgilés et al, 2020;Romero et al, 2020) as well as increased stress and parent-child con ict (Russell et al, 2020;Spinelli et al, 2020).…”