Buffers of the intergenerational continuity of childhood adversity among families experiencing homelessness

• In Event: Poster Session 04
  In Poster Session: PS 04 Topic - Family Context & Processes

Abstract

Background: Strong evidence supports the intergenerational continuity of childhood adversity from parents to children (Augustyn et al., 2019). Given that children exposed to greater adversity are at heightened risk for negative developmental outcomes (McLaughlin et al., 2019), it is important to understand and disrupt pathways of intergenerational adversity before they affect children. Although several decades of research have examined how parents’ adversity during childhood and adulthood may increase the continuity of adversity to children, research on protective factors that may disrupt these negative intergenerational cascades is less developed (Alink & Madigan, 2019). The purpose of the current study was to examine two plausible buffers of intergenerational childhood adversity—parent reports of their own positive childhood experiences and their current parenting efficacy—among families experiencing homelessness.

Method: Aim 1 replicated the association between child adversity and negative developmental outcomes. We hypothesized that children with higher adversity exposure would have more emotional-behavioral problems and poorer cognitive outcomes. Aim 2 examined protective factors that buffered the intergenerational continuity of childhood adversity. We expected that parents with higher levels of childhood adversity would have offspring with elevated rates of adversity in the next generation. Second, we expected parents’ positive childhood experiences and current parenting efficacy to moderate the association between parent and offspring adversity. Participants included 128 parents (M age = 31.5, 70.1% African American) and their 4-6-year-old children (59.4% male), residing in emergency housing over the course of two summers. Parents completed questionnaires while children participated in cognitive tasks. Missing data ranged from 0-8.5% so multivariate imputation chained equations was used for 128 participants with 100 imputations.

Results: Partially consistent with the hypotheses, children exposed to more adversity had poorer parent-reported socio-emotional regulation but not worse cognitive functioning. As expected, higher levels of parental childhood adversity were associated with higher levels of their children’s adversity. When examining buffers of intergenerational risk, parents’ positive childhood experiences did not have a main effect on reducing child’s exposure to adversity nor did they moderate the intergenerational continuity of adversity. Alternatively, higher levels of parenting efficacy were directly associated with lower levels of offspring adversity but did not moderate the continuity of adversity from parent to child. An exploratory analysis suggested that parents’ positive experiences in childhood were positively associated with greater parent efficacy.

Conclusion & Implications: Results suggest that greater current parenting efficacy, but not parents’ own positive experiences in childhood, were directly related to lower adversity exposure in the next generation. Consistent with prior research, this finding suggests that current parenting may serve as an important disrupter of intergenerational risk (Greene et al., 2020). Further, parents’ retrospective reports of their positive experiences in childhood were positively associated with their perceived parenting efficacy. These findings provide preliminary evidence that despite the presence of childhood adversity, parents’ positive childhood experiences may indirectly disrupt intergenerational risk through facilitating more positive parenting capacities. Future research with prospective longitudinal data and observed (rather than self-reported) parenting quality and efficacy is needed to examine these mediating mechanisms.

Authors

• Cara M. Lucke, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities
  Presenting Author

• Jillian Merrick, Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author

• Angela J. Narayan, University of Denver
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ann S. Masten, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities
  Non-Presenting Author