Race, Socioeconomic Status, and Mothers’ Parental Stress

Studies on parenting and mental health have documented both racial differences in mothers’ parental stress levels and mixed evidence on the impacts of mothers’ socioeconomic status (SES) on their parental stress. Less is known about how the association between mothers’ SES and parental stress varies...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inSociety and mental health Vol. 12; no. 2; pp. 99 - 118
Main Author Yan, Hope Xu
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01.07.2022
Sage Publications Ltd
Subjects
Childhood
Kindergarten
Low income groups
Mental health
Mothers
Parents & parenting
Race
Racial differences
Socioeconomic status
Stress
SES
parental stress
race
motherhood
mental health
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Summary:Studies on parenting and mental health have documented both racial differences in mothers’ parental stress levels and mixed evidence on the impacts of mothers’ socioeconomic status (SES) on their parental stress. Less is known about how the association between mothers’ SES and parental stress varies by race, or to what extent this variation contributes to racial differences in mothers’ levels of parental stress. This study addresses these questions using data from the second wave of Early Childhood Longitudinal Study: 2010–2011 Kindergarten Class (N = 8,548). The ordinary least squares (OLS) regression and Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition results show that compared with white and Asian mothers, low income and education have more detrimental impacts on black and Hispanic mothers’ feelings of parental stress. This racially diverse association between mothers’ SES and parental stress is an important reason why Asian mothers face higher parental stress than black and Hispanic mothers.
ISSN:2156-8693
2156-8731
DOI:10.1177/21568693221091690