Parent-child separation and diurnal cortisol rhythms: Evidence from left-behind children and adolescents in rural China

• In Event: Adverse experiences and adolescents’ physiological and mental health: The protective effects of resources

Abstract

Introduction. The presence of parents and caregivers is essential for children’s survival and healthy development. Research documents the detrimental impact of prolonged parent-child separation on youth development across cognitive, mental health and behavioral domains (see Waddoups et al., 2019 for a review). Despite growing interest in investigating how parent-child separation contributed to children and adolescents’ physiological health (e.g., immune system, see Liu et al., 2021), very few studies have examined the link between parent-child separation and the functioning of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) axis, the human central stress response system (Gunnar & Quevedo, 2007). Addressing this gap, the present study examines the impact of prolonged parent-child separation on HPA functioning, with a specific focus on diurnal cortisol rhythms among children and adolescents left by one or both parents (LBC) in rural areas of China.

Method. The sample consists of 293 children (Mage = 10.80, SD = .82; 33.4% female; 66.2% were LBC) recruited from a socioeconomically disadvantaged rural area of China. Participants completed the questionnaires about demographics and LBC experiences during class sessions. Next, they were instructed to provide salivary cortisol and complete diary checklists three times a day (upon waking, 30 minutes after waking, and before going to bed) over three consecutive days. A total of 2,524 cortisol samples from 293 children were included in the current analysis.
Grounded in a cumulative risk framework (Evans et al., 2013), this study created a composite score for vulnerabilities associated with LBC experiences using the z-score of the five LBC characteristics: (1) parental migration (0 = single-parent migration, 1 = both-parent migration); (2) the primary caregiver (0 = parents, 1 = relatives or others); (3) age of separation (continuous, ranging from 0 to 12 years old); (4) duration of separation (continuous, ranging from “6 months or less” to “5 years or above”); and (5) migrant experiences (0 = no, 1 = yes). We categorized LBC into two groups using the cumulative LBC risk scores: low-risk LBC (the bottom 66%) and high-risk LBC (the upper 34%). Two-level multilevel modeling was first conducted to examine diurnal cortisol patterns among non-LBC (n = 99), low-risk LBC (n = 125), and high-risk LBC (n = 69) groups, and then the main effects of LBC characteristics on diurnal cortisol patterns among LBC participants.

Results. Different diurnal cortisol patterns were observed among non-LBC, low-risk LBC, and high-risk LBC groups (Figure 1). Results of ANOVA analyses observed significant group differences in cortisol awakening response (CAR; F (2, 272) = 17.53, p < .001) and diurnal cortisol slope (F (2, 272) = 1094.37, p < .001). Specifically, non-LBC and low-risk LBC had significantly larger CARs and steeper diurnal slopes than high-risk LBC. Moreover, this study found that of the five LBC experience characteristics, only age of separation was significant associated with diurnal cortisol slope, suggesting that children who were separated from parents at older ages were more likely to demonstrate steeper diurnal cortisol slopes (typically associated with better health outcomes) than did their peers who experienced parent-child separation earlier (Figure 2).

Authors

• Mingjun Xie, Beijing Normal University
  Presenting Author

• Yanping Jiang

• Samuele Zilioli, Wayne State University

• Shiyuan Xiang, Beijing Normal University

• SHAN ZHAO

• Danhua Lin, Beijing Normal University