Parenting Stress Moderates the Relation between Parental Trauma Exposure and Child Anxiety Symptoms
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ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Parenting Stress Moderates the Relation between Parental Trauma Exposure and Child Anxiety Symptoms Bridget Cho1 · Briana Woods‑Jaeger2 · Jessica L. Borelli3 Accepted: 18 October 2020 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Trauma exposure can lead to poor psychological health not only for those directly affected, but also for their children. Additional research is needed to understand mechanisms in the intergenerational sequelae of traumatic stress. The current study examined parenting stress as a moderator of the association between parents’ lifetime trauma exposure and school-aged children’s internalizing symptoms (N = 139 dyads). Results of multiple regression analyses showed that the relationships between parental trauma exposure and child separation anxiety and harm avoidance were significant when parenting stress was moderate to high, but not when parenting stress was low. Parental trauma exposure was not significantly associated with child depressive symptoms. Clinical implications include the importance of screening and addressing parents’ trauma exposure and parenting stress in the context of child and family mental health services. Further research is needed to explicate the mechanisms linking parents’ trauma exposure with child anxiety symptoms. Keywords Trauma · Parenting · Anxiety · Stress Most adults in the United States have experienced at least one traumatic event. The results of a large-scale nationally representative study found that 89.7% of respondents had experienced at least one traumatic event meeting DSM-5 criteria, with many endorsing multiple event types [1]. Trauma exposure is associated with a number of deleterious health consequences, including both physical and mental health problems [2–4]. Given the widespread nature of trauma exposure, investigating the paths through which trauma exerts an impact on children is a public health priority [5]. Trauma exposure can have intergenerational consequences, affecting not only the exposed individuals but also their children. Not only is parental trauma exposure associated with an increased risk of trauma exposure for children [6], but it is also associated with child psychopathology even in the absence of child trauma exposure [7–9]. Results of * Bridget Cho [email protected] 1
Psychology Department, University of South Carolina Aiken, 471 University Parkway, Aiken, SC 29803, USA
2
Behavioral Sciences and Health Education, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, USA
3
Department of Psychological Science, University of California Irvine, Irvine, CA, USA
a recent literature review indicate that young children of parents with PTSD symptoms tend to be more emotionally labile and have more negative affect, and that when these children are older, they tend to have more problems with psychosocial functioning [10]. According to the tripartite model, negative affect is a core feature of both depressive and anxiety disorders [11], suggesting that children of parents struggling with the
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