Trajectories of Family Mental Health During COVID-19: A Focus on Socioeconomic Contexts

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Abstract

The economic and social disruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic have profoundly affected families. Millions of cases have been confirmed, schools have been closed, unemployment has skyrocketed, and the economic disparity gap has widened. Although informative, emerging studies about the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on families have limitations including (a) restricted ability to examine changes over time, (b) limited exploration of within-group processes among underrepresented populations, and (c) a reliance on economically secure families. This has left unanswered questions as to the extent to which the pandemic has disrupted vulnerable families’ well-being across time. The four papers in this symposium address these gaps 1) by examining trajectories of children’s mental health before and after the pandemic declaration and 2) exploring the co-occurring, ever-changing, and cumulative impact of financial hardship and caregiver’s mental health on children’s psychological well-being; 3) by using methods to increase ecological validity of the changing contexts around the pandemic and 4) by focusing on diverse populations that have been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. Across these studies, the participants represent economically, racially/ethnically, nationally, and contextually diverse families. These include low-wage Latino families with essential workers in California, parents working in hourly service-industry in Philadelphia, and children attending early childhood centers and public schools in Toronto. All studies are continuing data collection to determine the long-term impact of socioeconomic and social disruptions on family well-being. Disseminating this research has the potential to inform family policies to improve mental health outcomes for diverse communities of parents and children.

Sub Unit

• Solicited Content: COVID-19 Related

Chair

• Elisa Ugarte, University of California - Davis

Individual Presentations

• Children’s Mental Health Problems during the Emergence of COVID-19 - Presenting Author: Shealyn S May, University of Waterloo; Non-Presenting Author: Laura Colucci, University of Waterloo; Non-Presenting Author: Dillon Browne, University of Waterloo

• The Psychological and Economic toll of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Latina Mothers in Primarily Low-income Essential Worker Families - Presenting Author: Chase James Boyer, University of California - Davis; Non-Presenting Author: Andrea Cecilia Buhler-Wassmann, New York University; Non-Presenting Author: Leah Corinne Hibel, University of California - Davis

• The Cascading Effects of the COVID19 Pandemic on Family Hardship and Children’s Psychological Well-Being - Presenting Author: Anna Gassman-Pines, Duke Univeristy; Non-Presenting Author: Elizabeth Oltmans Ananat, Barnard College

• A Within-person Approach to the Psychological Impact of COVID-19 on Latina Mothers and their Children - Presenting Author: Elisa Ugarte, University of California - Davis; Non-Presenting Author: Chase James Boyer, University of California - Davis; Non-Presenting Author: Andrea Cecilia Buhler-Wassmann, New York University; Non-Presenting Author: Siwei Liu, University of California, Davis; Non-Presenting Author: Leah Corinne Hibel, University of California - Davis