Impact of prior childcare stability and social support during COVID-19 on maternal/child mental health

• In Event: Poster Session 12
  In Poster Session: PS 12 Topic - School Readiness/Childcare

Abstract

The stability of early childhood education and care (ECEC) is associated with secure attachments and increased sensitive interactions from caregivers (Kershaw et al., 2005; Loeb et al., 2004) and has long-lasting impacts on children (Howes, 1988). Instability, in contrast, is detrimental to children’s outcomes and has been related to problematic behaviors (Claessens & Chen, 2013; Sandstrom & Huerta, 2013) which lead to increased maternal stress (Bratsch-Hines et al., 2015). These effects are exacerbated for children from low-income families (Moran, 2020; Sandstrom & Huerta, 2013). During COVID-19 most children were abruptly removed from their ECEC and their families were forced to make immediate adjustments while experiencing other pandemic-related stressors. Many families faced financial and employment instability, which lead to increased stress, anxiety and depression (Brown et al., 2020). Mothers, in particular, reported a substantial increase in mental health challenges during the pandemic (Brown et al., 2020; Davenport et al., 2020; Thapa et al., 2020) but report lower levels of anxiety when they have social and ECEC support (Chavis, 2016; Brown et al., 2020). In the proposed study we test the effects of prior ECEC stability and the availability of social and ECEC supports on the psychological functioning of mothers and children during COVID-19. Specifically, are the negative effects of crises on child and maternal mental health mitigated by i) histories of ECEC stability, ii) more social support and iii) more ECEC support when accounting for changes in income? We use a quasi-experimental design by drawing on data from an ongoing longitudinal study in Toronto, Canada. Participants are very low-income families who were on a waitlist to receive a childcare subsidy. Four waves of data were collected using phone surveys with parents when children were between 12-24 months, 30-42 months, entering Junior Kindergarten and during COVID-19. Across the waves, demographic information (ethnicity, gender, income and education), ECEC histories (type of each placement, duration and reasons for changes) and maternal mental health (stress, anxiety and depression) were collected. Starting at Wave 2, the Strengths and Difficulties questionnaire was used to measure children’s conduct, peer and emotional problems, hyperactivity and prosocial behaviors. Mothers’ perceived social support was collected during the COVID-19 wave. Preliminary findings utilize data for 107 families with children between 51 to 76 months of age. Data collection is underway, and we anticipate utilizing a substantially larger sample for the final paper (200 additional responses have been collected since the preliminary analyses). Comparison of scores before and after the pandemic revealed significantly higher stress, anxiety and depression levels for mothers post-COVID-19. Children had significantly higher emotional problems and prosocial behavior as well as lower levels of conduct problems after the onset of the pandemic (see Table 1). Given these findings, we will run a Path Analysis based on the conceptual model in Figure 1 when data collection is complete. We hypothesize that histories of stable ECEC and higher levels of maternal social and ECEC support during the pandemic will buffer the negative effects of the pandemic on child and maternal mental health.

Authors

• Sumayya Saleem, University of Toronto
  Presenting Author

• Samantha Caitlin Burns, University of Toronto
  Non-Presenting Author

• Petr Varmuza
  Non-Presenting Author

• Olesya Falenchuk, University of Toronto
  Non-Presenting Author

• Michal Perlman, University of Toronto
  Non-Presenting Author