Acculturation Stress Magnifies Child Depression Effect of Stressful Life Events for Latinx Youth 3 Years Later.

Introduction: Experiences of stressful life events (SLEs) during childhood are associated with greater risk for youth psychopathology. Although SLEs are reported in greater frequency by Latinx families, Latinx populations remain largely absent in the SLE literature. Furthermore, Latinx populations face added stressors related to socio-political climate, acculturation, and racism and discrimination. The purpose of this study was to explore the intersection between parent-reported SLEs and acculturation (i.e., socio-political climate-related) stressors for Latinx youth. Greater frequency of caregiver reported SLEs were hypothesized to predict higher depressive symptoms in their children three years later, and acculturation stress was hypothesized to amplify these effects. Method: The community-recruited, low-income sample for this study consisted of 198 Latinx caregivers (98.5% mothers, 77.3% foreign-born) and their children (M age = 7.4, 47.5% female). Study hypotheses were tested using MPlus. Results: Consistent with prior literature, more SLEs reported at age 7 by parents were associated with more child-reported depressive symptoms at age 10 but only among boys. However, for both boys and girls, there was a significant interaction between acculturation stress and family SLEs. Specifically, as the amount of acculturation stress reported at age 7 increased, the negative impact of family SLEs on child-reported depressive symptoms at age 10 was magnified, regardless of gender. Conclusion: Adding to the literature on SLEs within Latinx families, these results indicate that acculturation and socio-political climate stressors need be considered in discussions of the effects of life stress on Latinx youth and their families.

"At the end of the day, someone done lost their child": A mixed methods analysis of Black families' experiences of the sociopolitical climate.

How Black Americans in the United States (U.S.) make sense of a sociopolitical climate marked by racist imagery, tensions, and police violence is important to understand given the numerously documented detrimental effects of racism-related stress on the well-being of Black parents and children. Informed by Racism-Related Stress Theory, the current study employed a convergent parallel mixed methods design to better understand the ways racism-related stressors in the sociopolitical climate impacted the daily lives and mental health of a sample of Black families with low income. Seventy-eight Black American preadolescents (Mage = 11.0; 43.6% girls) and their parents (79% mothers; 76% living below the U.S. federal poverty level [FPL]) from the southwestern U.S. reported their symptoms of depression and how they had been affected by racial stressors in the sociopolitical climate between Fall 2018 and Summer 2019. A nested sample of 10 parents (80% mothers; 80% living below the FPL) from the quantitative sample also participated in a semi-structured interview. Meta-inferences across methods were drawn pertaining to the influence of child gender on parents' interpretation of effects for children, the toll racism-related stress in the sociopolitical climate takes on Black families, and the transferal of effects on parents to children through parenting and parental depressive symptoms. Findings spotlight the need for policies and family-centered programming that address the racism-related stress faced by many Black youth and their families. Providing families with opportunities and tools that can potentially mitigate harmful effects and foster empowerment could promote positive and lasting change.

Preparing Black and Latinx children for police encounters: Caregiver response profiles and child self-regulation.

We hypothesized that the goodness-of-fit between profiles of observed, caregiver-provided ethnic-racial socialization (ERS), and child self-regulation (i.e., inhibitory control) would differentially associate with child behavioral outcomes. Conversations between 80 caregivers (45% Latinx; 55% Black) and their children (M age  = 11.09; 46% female) were rated for ERS. Measures included an inhibitory control composite (ages 2.5-3.5) and the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL; age 12). Three profiles were determined: Comprehensive (n  = 34), Reactive (n  = 8), and Pragmatic (n  = 38). Only youth with low inhibitory control in preschool appeared to benefit from Pragmatic ERS, whereas youth with normative or high inhibitory control in early childhood displayed lower internalizing and externalizing behaviors when they had Comprehensive or Reactive rather than Pragmatic caregivers.

A Longitudinal Study of Language Use During Early Mother-Child Interactions in Spanish-Speaking Families Experiencing Low Income.

PURPOSE: This longitudinal study assessed continuity and stability of productive language (vocabulary and grammar) and discourse features (turn-taking; asking and responding to questions) during mother-child play. METHOD: Parent-child language use in 119 Spanish-speaking, Mexican immigrant mothers and their children at two ages (M = 2.5 and 3.6 years) was evaluated from transcriptions of interactions. RESULTS: Child productive language significantly increased over the year, whereas mothers showed commensurate increases in vocabulary diversity but very little change in grammatical complexity. Mother-child discourse was characterized by discontinuity: Mothers decreased their turn length and asked fewer questions while children increased on both measures. Rates of responding to questions remained high for both mothers and children even as children increased and mothers decreased over time. Mothers and children showed significant rank-order stability in productive language and measures of discourse. Mothers' rate of asking questions and children's responses to questions during the first interaction predicted children's receptive vocabulary a year later. CONCLUSIONS: As children become more sophisticated communicators, language input remains important, with discourse features growing in relevance. Children's early opportunities to respond to parents' questions in the context of play benefit their language skills. This work extends the evidence base from monolingual English-speaking families and is interpreted in the context of prior research on parenting practices in U.S. families of Mexican origin.

Severe Poverty and Growth in Behavioral Self-Regulation: The Mediating Role of Parenting.

This study examined how exposure to severe poverty related to behavioral self-regulation growth during early childhood as mediated by parenting practices. Ethnic differences were tested. Data were collected across 4 waves from 359 low-income African American and Latino families. The frequency of exposure to severe poverty was indicated by how many times family income fell below 50% of the federal poverty line across 4 waves. Behavioral self-regulation was assessed when children were 3½, 6, and 7 years old (Wave 2-4), and parenting was observed when children were age 2½ years old (Wave 1). More frequent exposure to severe poverty was associated with slower behavioral self-regulation growth, and the effect was partially mediated through less sensitive and supportive parenting practices for Latino families. The mediation was not observed for African American families. Targeting the promotion of sensitive and supportive parenting practices may be an effective strategy for accelerating self-regulation development.

Patterns of Conflict Interaction in Mother-Toddler Dyads: Differences Between Depressed and Non-depressed Mothers.

We examined the differences in conflict interaction between depressed mothers and their toddler and non-depressed dyads and whether these differences mediated the association of maternal depression with compromised child socioemotional development. Mother/ child interaction was videotaped during a teaching task and during a free play task as part of a home visit when the target child was between 16 and 18 months old. Each turn of every conflict was coded for behavior and affect of each member of the dyad. Interaction data were summarized to calculate the number of conflict turns, the rate of conflict, and the proportion of mother-initiated versus child-initiated conflicts per dyad. Sequential analysis was used to estimate the probability of specific maternal responses to specific child behaviors. Bivariate comparisons indicated that depressed dyads experienced higher rates of conflict, especially during the teaching task, and that depressed mothers were more likely to respond destructively to child oppositional behavior. Results of multivariate linear regression indicated that the higher probability of destructive response mediated the association of maternal depression with lower quality of mother-child attachment. These findings have implications for the development of interventions to support mothers in dealing with the conflicts that are so common during the second year of a child's life.