Links between mothers’ and fathers’ depression trajectory profiles and parenting behaviors during preschool age

• In Event: Parental mental health

Abstract

Depressive symptoms experienced by parents have harmful effects on the quality of parent-child relationships as well as child outcomes (Galbally & Lewis, 2017; Hanington et al., 2011). Studies have found that maternal depression in early childhood influences children’s social competence as well as internalizing and externalizing behaviors through poor parenting behaviors (Kim & Cho, 2017; Park et al., 2019). Despite fathering not only contributing to children’s development but also creating a family climate for marital relationship of parents (Lamb, 1986), fathers’ psychological experiences have been rarely examined in relation to their parenting behaviors and child outcomes. Using a person-centered approach, the present study aims to (1) identify latent class trajectories of depressive symptoms across the preschool years for both mothers and fathers, and (2) examine class differences in parenting behaviors and child subjective happiness in middle childhood.

Participants were 1,826 mothers and 1,802 fathers from the Panel Study on Korean Children (PSKC), a nationally representative longitudinal study. Mothers and fathers self-rated depressive symptoms annually when children were 3 to 6 years old, using a Kessler’s psychological distress scale (Kessler et al., 2002) on a 5-point Likert scale. They also completed a parenting questionnaire developed by PSKC, which consisted of parental warmth and control subscales on a 5-point Likert scale when their child was 3 and 7. Children’s reported their overall happiness using a questionnaire developed by the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS, 2008) on a 4-point Likert scale at age 7 and 11.

Growth Mixture Modeling analyses revealed four distinctive latent class trajectories of parental depression from age 3 to 6 that were similar between mothers and fathers: High-Stable (mothers 6%, fathers 6.8%), High-Decreasing (mothers 4.9%, fathers 2.9%), Low-Increasing (mothers 3.5%, fathers 2.6%), and Low-Stable (mothers 85.6%, fathers 87.7%) classes. The patterns of change for each latent class are shown in Figure 1 and 2. BCH method was used to examine differences in parenting and child happiness across latent classes. For mothers, High-Stable class demonstrated the lowest level of warmth at age 3, and Low-Stable class showed higher warmth than High-Stable or High-Decreasing class at age 7. For fathers, High-Stable class demonstrated lower levels of warmth than Low-Increasing and Low-Stable classes at age 3. At age 7, Low-Stable class showed higher warmth than High-Stable and High-Decreasing classes. No class difference was found in the levels of parental control in either mothers or fathers. Children’s overall happiness was significantly different across maternal depression trajectories only: High-Stable class showed lower child happiness than Low-Stable class at both age 7 and 11.

We found inter-individual differences in the trajectories of maternal and paternal depression during the preschool years, and their differential links to parental warmth and control. Paternal depressive trajectories were not directly related to child happiness, but they may be indirectly related through paternal warmth depending on the timing of experiencing depressive symptoms. Implications for early intervention for parental mental health and parent-child relationship qualities will be discussed using attachment perspective (Thompson, 2008) and the relational developmental system framework (Overton, 2015).

Authors

• Ju-Hyun Song, Yonsei University
  Presenting Author

• Sook In Cho, Korea Institute of Child Care and Education

• Keng-Hie Song, Daegu University