A 30-year Longitudinal Study of Childhood Family Conflict, Positive Family Relationships, and Health in Adulthood

• In Event: 2-119 - Childhood Adversity and Youth Outcomes: Identifying Intergenerational and Longitudinal Pathways of Risk and Resilience

Integrative Statement

Well-documented links exist between adverse family environments and poor health outcomes (Repetti, Taylor & Seeman, 2002). Yet, mechanisms that explain this connection are still unclear. Moreover, the impact of positive family functioning in mitigating negative effects on youths’ health has received less attention, with prospective, longitudinal investigations even more rare (Chen, Brody, & Miller, 2017). In this study, we investigate the long-term associations between family conflict and parental responsivity during childhood and subsequent physical and mental health when youth reach middle adulthood, testing adolescent adjustment as a mediator of these links. Further, we look prospectively at the moderating role of positive family relationships (PFR) during adolescence that may protect against health problems.

Drawing from family systems perspectives (Minuchin, 1974) and a developmental stress buffering model (Chen et al., 2017), we hypothesize that childhood family conflict and low parental verbal and emotional responsivity will predict greater health problems in adulthood (H1) and that internalizing and externalizing symptoms during adolescence will mediate links between early family context and health (H2). We also hypothesize that PFR during adolescence will moderate connections between family conflict or parental responsivity and adjustment symptoms (H3). See Figure 1 for conceptual model.

Participants included 107 youth (47% females) and their families from the Fullerton Longitudinal Study (FLS), a long-term, ongoing investigation of child development beginning when children were age 1 through middle adulthood (age 38). Parents completed the Family Conflict subscale of the Family Environment Scale (Moos & Moos, 1974) when children were ages 3, 5, 7, and 8 years. Trained coders visited family homes when children were age 8 years to assess the quality of parents’ responsiveness and communication using the Emotional and Verbal Responsivity subscale of Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (HOME) – Elementary version (Bradley et al., 1988). Mothers and fathers separately completed the Child Behavior Checklist (Achenbach, 1991) to assess internalizing and externalizing symptoms when children were ages 15, 16, 17 years. Mothers and children independently completed the PFR scale (Preston et al., 2015) measuring how well family members get along and support each other, at ages 15, 16, 17 years. When youth were age 38 years, they completed a measure of global physical (e.g., pain, fatigue, ability to engage in physical activities including walking, climbing stairs) and mental health (e.g., mood, cognition, anxiety, depression symptoms) via the PROMIS Scale (Hays et al., 2009).

Regression models indicated significant direct effects of both childhood family conflict and parental responsivity on global health in adulthood. Additionally, internalizing and externalizing symptoms in adolescence each partially mediated associations between early family predictors and adult health. Evidence for the moderating role of PFR was also found: for youth who experienced positive, supportive family relationships during adolescence, low levels of parental emotional and verbal responsivity in childhood were not related to adolescent internalizing or externalizing symptoms. Our data suggest that positive family relationships decrease youths’ risk for adjustment problems, and reduce the negative impact of early family stressors on subsequent health in middle adulthood, over three decades later.

Author

• Michelle C. Ramos, California State University, Fullerton
  Presenting Author