A two-way street: Mothers’ and adolescent daughters’ depression and PTSD symptoms jointly predict dyadic behaviors.

Abstract

Dyadic interactions may be affected by the mental health of either partner; however, both partners’ symptoms are typically not considered simultaneously in observational studies of parent-child relationships. Using the Actor Partner Interdependence Model (APIM), we examine how depression and PTSD symptoms in mothers and adolescent daughters predict their own and each other’s relational behaviors (warmth, hostility, communication) during interactions, and whether partners’ relational behaviors predict changes in symptoms one month later. Participants include 150 mother (mean age = 41.6) and daughter (mean age = 15.1) dyads from diverse (57% Latina; 23% Black, 20% White), low-income families. Mothers and daughters reported on their symptoms and participated in a videotaped interaction task. A subset completed a follow-up interview one month later. For both depression and PTSD, mothers’ and daughters’ symptoms predicted their own relational behaviors (actor effects). In contrast, partner effects varied by symptom type and family role. Adolescents’ depressive symptoms predicted how their mothers acted towards them, beyond maternal symptoms (an additive partner effect); the converse was not true. Mother and daughter PTSD symptoms interactively predicted daughters’ relational behaviors (an actor*partner interaction), with buffering or exacerbating effects based on dyad symptom similarity. PTSD symptoms had unique effects beyond depression. In longitudinal analysis, mothers’ relational behaviors predicted changes in adolescents’ depressive symptoms, but adolescent behaviors were unrelated to subsequent maternal symptoms. Findings suggest that depression and PTSD symptoms may affect family relationships differently, and highlight the importance of considering both members’ symptoms during interactions. Implications for dyadic interventions are discussed.

Systematically Defined Informative Priors in Bayesian Estimation: An Empirical Application on the Transmission of Internalizing Symptoms Through Mother-Adolescent Interaction Behavior

“…The posteriors resulting from the logarithmic pooled priors were spiked and highly driven by the previous information as confirmed by the low associated shrinkage. In the current study, two studies (i.e., Pinquart, 2017 ; Milan and Carlone, 2018 ) caused all spikes. These studies reported estimates with extremely small (standardized) standard errors, thus strengthening the evidence for these effects.…”

“…These studies reported estimates with extremely small (standardized) standard errors, thus strengthening the evidence for these effects. While Pinquart (2017) conducted a longitudinal meta-analysis on the associations between parental behaviors and adolescent internalizing symptoms with over 1,000 included studies, Milan and Carlone (2018) investigated actor and partner effects in how mother and adolescent internalizing symptoms predicted maternal and adolescent behaviors during an interaction task. Both studies provide important information for our analyses, but do not precisely reflect our study design.…”

“…Observational, longitudinal assessments in adolescence best reflect our study’s design and thus provide strong specific information. The few studies that meet these criteria, however, remain inconsistent regarding whether maternal internalizing predict both subsequent positive ( Simons et al, 1993 ; Feng et al, 2007 ) and negative interaction behavior ( Feng et al, 2007 ) as well as whether interaction behavior predicts subsequent adolescent internalizing symptoms ( Hofer et al, 2013 ; Milan and Carlone, 2018 ) or not ( Feinberg et al, 2007 ; Schwartz et al, 2012 ). Studies on reversed associations from adolescents to mothers remain scarce and the one available study found that adolescent interaction behavior did not predict maternal internalizing symptoms ( Milan and Carlone, 2018 ).…”

Maternal affect and youth psychopathology: The role of mother-adolescent affect congruency

“…Similarly, adolescent-reported maternal negative affect was related to concurrent adolescent internalizing and externalizing symptoms (Stocker et al, 2007). Previous studies further indicated that maternal positive affect was associated with positive functioning, including prosocial behavior (Michalik et al, 2007) and social competence (Eisenberg et al, 2001), in (early) childhood as well as fewer problem behaviors in childhood (Cumberland-Li et al, 2003;Eisenberg et al, 2001;McCoy & Raver, 2011) and adolescence (Milan & Carlone, 2018). Generally, these studies suggest that higher levels of maternal negative affect and lower levels of maternal positive affect contribute to adolescent psychopathological symptoms.…”

Influence of transition readiness from paediatric to adult health care on quality of life in child–parent dyads with long‐term conditions

“…Recently, with in‐depth exploration of the Theory of Dyadic Illness Management, APIM is increasingly applied to estimate inherent interdependence between dyadic ones in different situations. Cross‐sectional and longitudinal research all indicated children's emotion and parents' perception of children were connected and interacted with their physiological and psychological states (Fagan & Palkovitz, 2019; Han & Lee, 2020; Jeong & Hun‐Ha, 2020; Milan & Carlone, 2018). However, interaction of QoL and perspective of children's transition readiness concerning dyadic phenomena between parent–child relationships are rarely considered relevant.…”