Poster #101 - Structural Factors in Parenting Stress During the COVID-19 Pandemic

• In Event: Poster Session 15

Abstract

Background: Distress levels have been high during the COVID-19 pandemic for parents of young children, especially for single parents, those with children with special needs, and families experiencing material hardship, and levels continue to rise (RAPID-EC, 2022). This emotional distress may spill over into how stressed parents feel about parenting their children. Policymakers continue to request data on who has been most impacted by the pandemic and how, so relief policies and programs can be targeted towards those families. The goal of this study was to determine when parents of young children experienced the greatest levels of parenting stress during the pandemic and for whom parenting stress was consistently high. We hypothesized that those with consistently higher parenting stress would be more likely to be single parents, working from home, experiencing material hardship, and have multiple children under six years old. Methods: 14,728 parents of children under 6 years old completed an online survey as part of a nationwide biweekly survey, between April 2020 and July 2022. Parenting stress was assessed using parent self-report on three items of the Parenting Stress Index, Fourth Edition (PSI-IV; Abidin, 2012). The average levels of parenting stress during two phases of the pandemic, 1) April 2020 through the Delta variant surge and 2) post-Delta, were calculated. A person-centered approach using latent profile analysis (LPA) was then conducted to determine the optimal number of latent profiles. Results: On average, parenting stress was significantly higher post-Delta (Nov 2021 to July 2022) compared to prior to the Delta wave (t = -5.42, p < 0.001, df = 6,224). Preliminary analyses on a subset of the sample (n = 1,736) with complete parenting stress data were completed to date. A five-class solution was optimal for the parenting stress data (Table 1), with consistently average (Class 1; 41%, n = 719), high increasing (Class 2; 9%, n = 160), high decreasing (Class 3; 28%, n = 482), very low (Class 4; 4%, n = 61), and low (Class 5; 18%, n = 314) parenting stress groups. As a next step, we will complete the analyses on the full sample (N = 14,728) and use Full Information Maximum Likelihood (FIML) to address missing data. Logistic regression analyses with the full sample will also be completed to determine whether class membership varies based on experiencing material hardship, working from home, single versus two-parent households, and having multiple young children. Discussion: Parenting stress was higher among parents of young children between November 2021 and July 2022, possibly due to juggling returns to in-person childcare and work during continued waves of COVID-19 (e.g., Omicron). Our planned analyses will determine which families have been the most impacted by the pandemic in terms of parenting stress, which may inform targeted relief efforts.

Authors

• Emily Reilly, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities
  Presenting Author

• Sihong Liu, Stanford University

• Megan R. Gunnar, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities

• Joan Lombardi, Georgetown University

• Philip Fisher, Stanford University