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Psychological wellbeing and mental health
Adolescent mental health and subsequent parenting: a longitudinal birth cohort study
  1. M Byford1,
  2. R A Abbott2,
  3. B Maughan3,
  4. M Richards1,
  5. D Kuh1
  1. 1MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing at UCL, London, UK
  2. 2Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
  3. 3Social Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry, Kings College London, London, UK
  1. Correspondence to M Byford, MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing at UCL, 33 Bedford Place, London WC1B 5JU, UK; m.byford{at}ucl.ac.uk

Abstract

Background Adolescent mental health problems are associated with a range of adverse outcomes in adulthood but little is known about the effects on adult parenting practices. This study aimed to examine prospective associations between adolescent conduct and emotional problems and subsequent parenting behaviours in adulthood.

Methods The study sample comprised 1110 members from the MRC National Survey of Health and Development. Prospective data were collected from teacher reports of conduct and emotional problems at age 13 and 15 years and adult outcome measures of parenting included intellectual environment, cognitive stimulation, coercive discipline, parental interest and parental aspiration.

Results In regression models adjusted for the confounding effects of social background, cognition and education, adolescent conduct problems predicted coercive parenting behaviours in adulthood. The effects of adolescent emotional problems on the development of coercive discipline practices were explained by covariates. Likewise, the inability of parents who displayed conduct problems in adolescence to provide an intellectually stimulating home environment was fully explained by the adjustment for education.

Conclusions Adolescents who exhibit conduct problems are more likely to develop coercive styles of parenting.

  • Life Course Epidemiology
  • Mental Health
  • Cohort Studies

This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 3.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/

https://doi.org/10.1136/jech-2013-202997

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      BMJ Publishing Group Ltd
      Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health 2014; 68 590-590 Published Online First: 30 Apr 2014. doi: 10.1136/jech-2013-202997corr1