A parent’s depression is not good for anyone in the family. Depressed parents are less likely to be engaged with or attentive to their children. And the children are more likely to experience a host of problems, including bad behavior and academic difficulty.
A group of US researchers considered a new perspective on this fairly well-researched downward spiral of misfortune. They asked: Do the particular parenting patterns of different ethnic groups aggravate the effect of parents’ depression on their children?
Nikki L. Aikens of Mathematica Policy Research and colleagues from the University of North Carolina spoke to parents and teachers of 393 children over the course of two years (from the beginning of their pre-kindergarten year to the end of their kindergarten year.) They also observed the children’s home lives.
They found that Latino parents were more likely than African-American and White parents to be depressed. But African-American children seemed to be more vulnerable to their parents’ depression than were the other children. They had more behavior problems, according to both their parents and their teachers.
The reason for the link between parents’ depression and kids’ behavior problems might be discord in the home. There was more often conflict in the relationship between depressed African American parents and their children than among families from other ethnic backgrounds – although it’s not clear why.
The authors admit that the equation they proposed: African America family + depression = parent-child conflict (which in turn equals behavior problems) is not necessarily supported by their data.
For example, it could be that children’s behavior problems, rather than being the effect of the conflict, were actually a contributory factor. Additionally, some of the stresses in parent’s lives (lack of money, poor housing conditions, etc.) could be behind both parents’ depression and their children’s poor behavior.
Rather significantly, in the light of the scientific direction of much similar research, the authors did not consider genetic factors in the link between parents’ depression and kids’ behavior.
However, should future research support the equation, Aikens and company suggest that protecting African American children from the effects of their parents’ depression should involve giving special attention to conflict in the home.
•Summary of “Ethnic Differences in the Effects of Parental Depression on Preschool Children's Socio-emotional Functioning “ by Nikki L. Aikens, Cheri P. Coleman, and Oscar A. Barbarin in Social Development, Volume 17, Issue 1, pp 137–160.