Parental mental health influenced child mental health outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic

1. In this systematic review and meta-analysis, worsening parental mental health was associated with poorer mental health outcomes in their children during the COVID-19 pandemic.

2. In addition, the quality of the relationship between the parent and child was an important mediator in the transmission of mental health disorders.

Evidence Rating Level: 1 (Excellent)

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced changes on many families and resulted in parents having to manage greater childcare demands than usual. Currently, studies evaluating children of parents with a mental illness, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, are limited. As a result, the objective of the present systematic review and meta-analysis was to synthesize the available research exploring the link between parental mental health symptoms and the mental health outcomes of their children during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Of 431 identified records, 83 (n=86,658 parents, 82,312 children) studies were included from various databases from 2020-2022. Studies were included if they reported parental mental health symptoms and their effects on their children’s mental health. Studies that did not report associations between child and parent variables were excluded. The review was performed using PRISMA guidelines. The risk of bias was assessed using the AXIS tool. The primary outcome was child mental health outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The results demonstrated that mental health symptoms experienced by parents (e.g., depression, anxiety) correlated significantly with worsened mental health outcomes in their children during the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, parenting stress had the greatest impact on child mental health outcomes. However, the quality of the parent-child relationship mediated the transmission of mental health disorders from parent to child. Despite these results, the study was limited by the inclusion of mostly cross-sectional studies, which prevented the determination of causality. Nonetheless, the present study added important knowledge of how parental mental health symptoms can influence the psychopathology of their children.

Click to read the study in International Journal Environmental Research and Public Health

Image: PD

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