TY - JOUR
AU - Foley, Sarah
AU - Badinlou, Farzaneh
AU - Brocki, Karin
AU - Frick, Matilda
AU - Ronchi, Luca
AU - Hughes, Claire
PY - 2021
DA - October
TI - Family function and child adjustment difficulties in the COVID-19 pandemic: An international study
JO - International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
VL - 18
IS - 21
DO - https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph182111136
AB - To estimate specific proximal and distal effects of COVID-19 related restrictions on families on children’s adjustment problems, we conducted a six-site international study. In total, 2516 parents from Australia, China, Italy, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America living with a young child (Mage = 5.77 SD = 1.10, range = 3 to 8 years, 47.9% female) completed an online survey between April and July 2020. The survey included the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire and family risk factors (parent distress, parent-child conflict, couple conflict and household chaos), as well as a scale to index COVID-19 related family disruption. Our analyses also included public data on the stringency of national restrictions. Across the six sites, parental responses indicated elevated levels of hyperactivity, conduct and emotion problems in children from families characterized by heightened levels of parent distress, parent-child conflict, and household chaos. In contrast, increased peer problems were more strongly related to COVID-19 related social disruption and stringency measures. Mediation models demonstrated that associations between COVID-19 social disruption and child difficulties could be explained by parental distress. Taken together, these results suggest that although the experience of the pandemic differed across countries, associations between COVID-19 related family experiences and child adjustment difficulties were similar in their nature and magnitude across six different contexts. Programmes to support family resilience could help buffer the impact of the pandemic for two-generations.
PB - MDPI
UR - https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/b3ba0412-9614-4e90-8e9e-1101f9cff547
KW - Coronavirus (COVID-19)
KW - Children, young people and families
KW - Mental health and wellbeing
ER