Perceived stress as mediator for longitudinal effects of the COVID-19 lockdown on wellbeing of parents and children

Abstract

Whereas children are physically less affected by the COVID-19 disease, dealing with lockdown may have negative effects on their wellbeing. At the same time, the lockdown might also have positive effects for families, as it might facilitate parent-child bonding. One important factor that may influence the direction of these effects is perceived stress in children and parents. Using a longitudinal twin design, we investigated how perceived stress influenced COVID-19 lockdown induced changes in wellbeing of parents (psychological symptoms and overreactivity) and children (internalizing and externalizing behavior). A total of 106 parents and 151 children (10-13-year-old, 47% girls, majority middle-high SES and Caucasian) enrolled in the longitudinal L-CID study filled in questionnaires during lockdown and data were combined with data of previous years. We report a significant increase in parental psychological symptoms and a decrease in parental overreactivity across time. Longitudinal child measures showed a decrease in internalizing and externalizing behavior, which seemed decelerated by the COVID-19 lockdown. Perceived stress was a significant mediator of changes in parental psychological symptoms: Parents who reported more psychological symptoms prior to the lockdown experienced more stress during the lockdown, which in turn was associated with an increase in psychological symptoms. Similar results were found for children’s externalizing behavior. Results further showed that perceived stress in children was associated with negative coping strategies, parental overreactivity and parental psychological symptoms. These results suggest that children in families with (a history of) parental psychological symptoms and overreactivity might be at risk for negative consequences of the COVID-19 lockdown.

Parents are stressed! Patterns of parent stress across COVID-19

“…Total scores ranged 0 to 40, with higher scores indicating greater stress. Total scores were categorized to describe parents who experienced low stress (0-13), moderate stress (14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26), and high stress (27-40) based on previously established cutoff values (22)(23)(24)(25). Parenting-specific stress was assessed at each timepoint: parents reported if their parenting-specific stress increased, decreased, or remained the same since before COVID-19 (at T1) and since May 2020 (at T2).…”

Parenting Adolescents in Times of a Pandemic: Changes in Relationship Quality, Autonomy Support, and Parental Control?

“…Indeed, the first empirical studies indicate that COVID-19 lockdown measures also negatively impacts family functioning, although some parents reported spending more time together as a family as something positive (Brown et al, 2020). For example, parents reported more mental health problems (Achterberg et al, 2020) and difficulties with managing their children's problem behavior or their children's academic functioning during the pandemic (Brown et al, 2020). Parental mental health problems, such as depressive and anxiety symptoms, in turn, predicted higher levels of parental stress (Achterberg et al, 2020;Brown et al, 2020).…”

“…For example, parents reported more mental health problems (Achterberg et al, 2020) and difficulties with managing their children's problem behavior or their children's academic functioning during the pandemic (Brown et al, 2020). Parental mental health problems, such as depressive and anxiety symptoms, in turn, predicted higher levels of parental stress (Achterberg et al, 2020;Brown et al, 2020). The extent to which parents experienced stress depended on family demands, such the extent to which they experienced quarantine difficult (Spinelli et al, 2020) and whether they were able to balance work and family life (Chung et al, 2020).…”

Mental well-being during Covid-19 in adults, mothers and children: behavioral evidence and neural premarkers

“…Such data indicates that interindividual differences in the effect of restrictions on mental health should be considered (de Quervain et al, 2020). For example, confinement may bring some families closer together, increase parent-child bonding time and joint experiences (Achterberg et al, 2020;Masten & Motti-Stefanidi, 2020). An increased understanding of interindividual differences that protect or increase risk for psychopathologies holds the potential to inform personalized support associated with pandemics.…”

“…The duration of lockdown or confinement has been linked to increasingly higher distress levels (Ozamiz-Etxebarria et al, 2020). Negative effects tend to be higher in younger individuals, those with chronic disease or pre-existing mental and physical health conditions, females and those living alone or in socioeconomic adversity (Achterberg et al, 2020;de Quervain et al, 2020;Kwong et al, 2020).…”