Parent Discrepancies in Ratings of Child Behaviors Following Wartime Deployment

Abstract

Researchers have shown that parents often disagree in their ratings of their children's behavior, and that these discrepancies are typically related to child and family characteristics (e.g., child's age, parent psychopathology). Few studies, however, have examined discrepancies in how mothers and fathers rate child behavior during a stressful family context such as a parent's wartime deployment. The present study of 174 military families (children aged 6 to 11 years; 54.0% female) examined whether family factors (parental sense of control, marital satisfaction) and contextual risk factors related to a parent's wartime deployment (number and length of deployments, battle experiences, and posttraumatic stress disorder [PTSD] symptoms) were associated with discrepancies in how mothers and fathers rated internalizing and externalizing behaviors in their children. Using a latent congruency model, our results showed that when parents self-reported higher levels of PTSD symptoms, both mothers, β = -.33, p = .021, and fathers, β = .41, p = .026, tended to also report higher levels of internalizing symptoms in their child, relative to what their spouse reported. In comparison to mothers, fathers also tended to report higher levels of child externalizing symptoms, β = .44, p = .019. Our findings may help clinicians understand how parent mental health within a stressful family context relates and/or informs a parent's ratings on assessments of his or her child's internalizing and externalizing symptoms.

A meta-analysis on the crossover of workplace traumatic stress symptoms between partners.

“…The crossover via couple interaction explanation for crossover posits that a workers’ posttraumatic stress symptoms negatively influence their partners by harming the quality of their relationships (Westman, 2001). Studies have found negative relationships between military members’ PTSD symptoms and relationship quality (Allen et al, 2010; Bergmann et al, 2014; Chesmore et al, 2018; Knobloch-Fedders et al, 2017; Renshaw & Campbell, 2017). Other research has shown that experiencing harassment at work is associated with poorer marital adjustment (Dionisi & Barling, 2015), as are PTSD symptoms related to workplace accidents (Lameiras et al, 2018).…”

“…In the workplace, traumatic stressors can involve threats of suffering, injury, or death to workers or those around them, and can also include severe forms of aggression such as bullying, sexual harassment, and violence. Within the military context, for instance, combat experiences are associated with PTSD symptoms and general distress (e.g., Allen et al, 2010; Chesmore et al, 2018; Snyder et al, 2016). Similarly, among police officers and firefighters, duty-related stressors (e.g., death encounters, physical threats, etc.)…”

Maternal support and caregiver–child symptom concordance among sexually abused children

“…More supportive mothers may have a heightened awareness of their children's CSA experiences and symptoms, and some caregivers might overestimate their child's symptoms, whereas others could be more accurate. Alternatively, mothers' ratings of children's symptoms are driven by other factors, such as maternal levels of PTSS and depression (Chesmore et al, 2018;Scheeringa et al, 2015). Further, there are a variety of potential factors that drive children's reporting of symptoms, including metacognition, therapeutic rapport, and, perhaps, their beliefs regarding the implications of disclosing their symptoms.…”

“…Low levels of concordance are also evident for both trauma exposure (Goodman et al., 2010; Hungerford et al., 2010; Oransky et al., 2013; Stover et al., 2010) and trauma‐related symptoms (Dyb et al., 2003; Humphreys et al., 2017; Scheeringa et al., 2006; Wamser‐Nanney & Campbell, 2021). Caregivers tend to report lower rates of their children's trauma exposure relative to what their children report (Ceballo et al., 2001; Oransky et al., 2013; Stover et al., 2010). Agreement regarding trauma exposure may be complicated, as it may require children to disclose the details of their experiences, including all of the trauma types to which they have been exposed.…”

“…The body of research investigating factors associated with caregiver–child concordance in reports of trauma‐related difficulties is, to date, small and somewhat inconsistent. Although caregiver support is a key factor in children's trauma disclosures (Ceballo et al., 2001; Goodman et al., 2010) as well as in initiating and continuing trauma‐focused treatment, only one known study to date has investigated the role of maternal support in caregiver–child symptom concordance following CSA (Everson et al., 1989). Discordance regarding trauma‐related symptoms has been associated with an increased likelihood of premature treatment termination (Wamser‐Nanney, 2020) as well as poorer treatment response among trauma‐exposed children (Humphreys et al., 2017; Lewis et al., 2012; Stover et al., 2010).…”