Interaction between adoptive mothers’ and fathers’ depressive symptoms in risk for children’s emerging problem behavior

The effect of parental depression on children's adjustment has been well documented, with exposure during early childhood particularly detrimental. Most studies that examine links between parental depression and child behavior are confounded methodologically because they focus on parents raisin...

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Published inSocial development (Oxford, England) Vol. 28; no. 3; pp. 725 - 742
Main Authors Hails, Katherine A., Shaw, Daniel S., Leve, Leslie D., Ganiban, Jody M., Reiss, David, Natsuaki, Misaki N., Neiderhiser, Jenae M.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published England Blackwell Publishing Ltd 01.08.2019
Subjects
Adopted children
Adoption
Adoption studies
Adoptive fathers
Adoptive mothers
Adoptive parents
Behavior problems
Childhood
Children & youth
depression
externalizing
Fathers
Genetics
Infancy
Infants
Internalization
internalizing
Internalizing disorders
Maternal depression
Mental depression
Mother-child relations
Mothers
Parental depression
parenting
Parents & parenting
externalizing
adoption
depression
internalizing
parenting
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Summary:The effect of parental depression on children's adjustment has been well documented, with exposure during early childhood particularly detrimental. Most studies that examine links between parental depression and child behavior are confounded methodologically because they focus on parents raising children who are genetically related to them. Another limitation of most prior research is a tendency to focus only on the effects of maternal depression while ignoring the influence of fathers’ depression. The purpose of this study was to examine whether infants’ exposure to both parents’ depressive symptoms, and inherited risk from birth mother internalizing symptoms, was related to school age children's externalizing and internalizing problems. Study data come from a longitudinal adoption study of 561 adoptive parents, biological mothers, and adopted children. Adoptive fathers’ depressive symptoms during infancy contributed independent variance to the prediction of children's internalizing symptoms and also moderated associations between adoptive mothers’ depressive symptoms and child externalizing symptoms.
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ISSN:0961-205X
1467-9507
DOI:10.1111/sode.12352