Although the association between maternal depression and adverse child outcomes is well established, the strength of the association, the breadth or specificity of the outcomes, and the role of moderators are not known This information is essential to inform not only models of risk but also the design of preventive interventions by helping to identify subgroups at greater risk than others and to elucidate potential mechanisms as targets of interventions A meta-analysis of 193 studies was conducted to examine the strength of the association between mothers’ depression and children’s behavioral problems or emotional functioning Maternal depression was significantly related to higher levels of internalizing, externalizing, and general psychopathology and negative affect/behavior and to lower levels of positive affect/behavior, with all associations small in magnitude These associations were significantly moderated by theoretically and methodologically relevant variables, with patterns of moderation found to vary somewhat with each child outcome Results are interpreted in terms of implications for theoretical models that move beyond main effects models in order to more accurately identify which children of depressed mothers are more or less at risk for specific outcomes

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Maternal Depression and Child Psychopathology: A Meta-Analytic Review

The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health data were used to test predictions from life history theory. We hypothesized that (1) in young adulthood an emerging life history strategy would exist as a common factor underlying many life history traits (e.g., health, relationship stability, economic success), (2) both environmental harshness and unpredictability would account for unique variance in expression of adolescent and young adult life history strategies, and (3) adolescent life history traits would predict young adult life history strategy. These predictions were supported. The current findings suggest that the environmental parameters of harshness and unpredictability have concurrent effects on life history development in adolescence, as well as longitudinal effects into young adulthood. In addition, life history traits appear to be stable across developmental time from adolescence into young adulthood.

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Effects of Harsh and Unpredictable Environments in Adolescence on Development of Life History Strategies: A Longitudinal Test of an Evolutionary Model

This study examined maternal parenting stress in a sample of 430 boys and girls including those at risk for externalizing behavior problems. Children and their mothers were assessed when the children were ages 2, 4, and 5. Hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) was used to examine stability of parenting stress across early childhood and to examine child and maternal factors predicting parenting stress at age 2 and changes in parenting stress across time. Results indicated that single parenthood, maternal psychopathology, child anger proneness, and child emotion dysregulation predicted 2-year parenting stress. Child externalizing behaviors predicted initial status and changes across time in parenting stress. Stability of parenting stress was dependent upon child externalizing problems, as well as interactions between child externalizing problems and gender, and child externalizing problems and emotion regulation. Results are discussed in the context of mechanisms by which parenting stress may influence the development of child externalizing behaviors.

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Predicting Change in Parenting Stress Across Early Childhood: Child and Maternal Factors

Notwithstanding the constant debate in the scientific and policy literature on the precise meaning of school readiness, research consistently demonstrates a wide variation between groups of children resulting in a gap at school entry. Recently, the teacher-completed Early Development Instrument (EDI), a new measure of children's school readiness in 5 developmental areas, was developed, tested, and implemented in Canada. EDI results confirmed the existence of a school entry gap. In this article, we explore factors in 5 areas of risk: socioeconomic status, family structure, child health, parent health, and parent involvement in literacy development. In a series of logistic regressions, we demonstrate that variables in all 5 areas, as well as age and gender, contribute to the gap. Child's suboptimal health, male gender, and coming from a family with low income contribute most strongly to the vulnerability at school entry. As the purpose of a tool like the EDI is primarily to assist in population-level report...

The school entry gap: Socioeconomic, family, and health factors associated with children's school readiness to learn.

Objective: This study aimed to replicate and extend previous work showing an association between maternal pre-pregnancy adiposity and risk for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms in children.

Methods:  A Swedish population-based prospective pregnancy–offspring cohort was followed up when children were 5 years old (N = 1,714). Mothers and kindergarten teachers rated children’s ADHD symptoms, presence and duration of problems, and emotionality. Dichotomized outcomes examined difficulties of clinical relevance (top 15% of the distribution). Analyses adjusted for pregnancy (maternal smoking, depressive symptoms, life events, education, age, family structure), birth outcomes (birth weight, gestational age, infant sex) and concurrent variables (family structure, maternal depressive symptoms, parental ADHD symptoms, and child overweight) in an attempt to rule out confounding.

Results:  Maternal pre-pregnancy overweight and obesity predicted high inattention symptom scores and obesity was associated with a two-fold increase in risk of difficulties with emotion intensity and emotion regulation according to teacher reports. Means of maternal ratings were unrelated to pre-pregnancy body mass index (BMI). Presence and duration of problems were associated with both maternal over and underweight according to teachers.

Conclusions:  Despite discrepancies between maternal and teacher reports, these results provide further evidence that maternal pre-pregnancy overweight and obesity are associated with child inattention symptoms and extend previous work by establishing a link between obesity and emotional difficulties. Maternal adiposity at the time of conception may be instrumental in programming child mental health, as prenatal brain development depends on maternal energy supply. Possible mechanisms include disturbed maternal metabolic function. If maternal pre-pregnancy obesity is a causal risk factor, the potential for prevention is great.

Maternal pre-pregnancy obesity and risk for inattention and negative emotionality in children

Objective: The current study examined how self-reported maternal stress and distress are associated with child disruptive behaviors. Method: Mother and teacher ratings of child disruptive behavior problems (attention problems, aggression, and delinquency) were collected for 215 male participants, ranging in age from 9 to 12 years. Participating mothers also provided self-report data on socioeconomic status (SES), parenting stress, and distress (depression and anxiety/somatization). Results: Low SES was significantly associated with both mother- and teacher-reported child disruptive behavior problems. Regression analyses indicated a relation between parenting stress and mother-reported child disruptive behavior problems, even when controlling for SES. Results also indicated a significant relation between maternal distress and mother-reported child disruptive behavior problems (particularly attention problems), even when controlling for SES and parenting stress. Maternal stress and distress were not significantly related to teacher-reported child disruptive behavior problems. Conclusions: Although the lack of an association between teacher-reported behavior problems and maternal stress and distress could be interpreted as a rater bias by these mothers, it may be that the mothers' symptoms are associated with a stressful home environment, thus exacerbating child disruptive behavior problems and eventually leading to a reciprocal relation between symptomatology in mothers and children.

Sarah J Cotten

Papers

The influence of maternal stress and distress on disruptive behavior problems in boys.