Parenting Stress and Executive Functioning in Preschool Children Following Participation in the BRIDGE Parenting Program

• In Event: Parent and Family Interventions: Applying pre-existing knowledge and experience in new and global contexts

Abstract

Young children’s immediate caregiving environment plays a critical role in the development of their executive functioning (EF) skills (Blair et al., 2014; Finegood & Blair, 2017). One factor that has been strongly linked to disruptions in parental well-being and parent-child bonding is parenting stress (De Cock et al., 2017; Skreden et al., 2012; Thompson Jr. et al., 1993). For mothers with depression, the likelihood of experiencing elevated levels of parenting stress, as well as more negative parent-child interactions, is significantly heightened (Huang et al., 2013; Lovejoy et al., 2000).

The prefrontal cortex, the brain area supporting EF abilities, undergoes a period of rapid development in the first few years of life (Diamond, 2006; Huttenlocher, 2002) which makes it particularly susceptible to the disruptive effects of less positive and warm parent-child interactions on EF development. Consequently, children’s day-to-day functioning (e.g., problem solving, decision making) and later life outcomes (e.g., school readiness, overall health and success) may also be impeded (Diamond, 2013; McClelland et al., 2013; Zelazo, 2015). The present study investigates whether reductions in parenting stress, as measured before and after participation in a novel parenting intervention program designed to promote positive parent-child relationships and prevent the intergenerational transmission of mental illness (Roos et al., 2020), are associated with improvements in children’s EF abilities.

Participants were (N = 24) mothers with depression and their 3-to 5-year-old children who completed a pre-intervention assessment, 20-week parenting program, and post-intervention assessment from Fall 2021 to Winter 2022. Pre- to post-intervention changes in parenting stress and children’s EF were assessed with responses on the Parenting Stress Index-Short Form and performance on the Day-Night and Happy-Sad Stroop tasks, respectively.

A Repeated Measures Generalized Linear Model procedure determined that among the 24 mother-child dyads who completed the program, pre- to post-intervention reductions in parenting stress were significantly associated with improvements in children’s Stroop performance (with accuracy averaged across the two tasks), r(24) = -.589, p = .002. Similarly, significant associations emerged between pre- to post-intervention reductions in parenting stress and improvements in children’s Stroop performance, when accuracy on the Day-Night [r(22) = -.466, p = .029] and Happy-Sad tasks [r(22) = -.524, p = .012] was considered separately.

These findings provide preliminary support for a relationship between reduced parenting stress and children’s improved EF abilities following participation in a novel parenting program aimed at decreasing parenting stress and fostering positive parent-child relationships. For professionals working with mothers with depression and their young children, these results could inform clinical intervention approaches for strengthening children’s EF skills through the use of specific behaviour management strategies that help mother-child dyads navigate challenging situations in a thoughtful and constructive manner (Roos et al., 2020). Future research will aim to address the limitations of the study by recruiting a larger sample and adding a control group to provide further support for program efficacy and the link between parenting stress and EF abilities in early childhood.

Authors

• Chhavvy Narendra, University of Manitoba
  Presenting Author

• Lara Penner-Goeke, University of Winnipeg

• Leslie E. Roos, University of Manitoba

• Ryan Giuliano, University of Manitoba