Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T08:14:27.624Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Parents’ adverse childhood experiences and parent–child emotional availability in an American Indian community: Relations with young children's social–emotional development

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2019

Hannah E. Wurster ,
Michelle Sarche ,
Caitlin Trucksess ,
Brad Morse  and
Zeynep Biringen
Hannah E. Wurster*
Affiliation:
One Health Institute, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, USA
Michelle Sarche
Affiliation:
Centers for American Indian and Alaska Native Health, Community and Behavioral Health, Colorado School of Public Health, University of Colorado at Denver, Denver, CO, USA
Caitlin Trucksess
Affiliation:
Centers for American Indian and Alaska Native Health, Community and Behavioral Health, Colorado School of Public Health, University of Colorado at Denver, Denver, CO, USA
Brad Morse
Affiliation:
Colorado Multiple Institutional Review Board, University of Colorado at Denver, Denver, CO, USA
Zeynep Biringen
Affiliation:
Department of Human Development and Family Services, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, USA
*
Author for correspondence: Hannah Wurster, 303 Behavioral Sciences Building, 1570 Campus Delivery, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO80523-1570; E-mail: [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This study examined relations among parent adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), parent mental distress, child social–emotional functioning, and parent emotional availability (EA) among parents and children served by an Early Head Start program in an American Indian community. The majority of parents and children in the study were American Indian/Alaska Native. American Indian/Alaska Native communities experience relatively high rates of trauma, socioeconomic disparities, and mental health challenges. In this context, young children may be especially vulnerable to early life stress. Further, a strong body of literature demonstrates the long-term effects of ACEs on individuals’ mental health, as well as their child's social–emotional functioning. In this study we examined a model to test the relation of parent ACEs to children's social–emotional functioning, with an indirect effect via a latent “mental distress” variable consisting of parent depression, anxiety, and parenting-related distress. Results supported this model, suggesting that parent ACEs related to children's social–emotional problems by way of parent mental distress. However, when a categorical measure of parent EA was added as a moderator, the model only remained significant in the low EA parent group. These results provided evidence for a “buffering” effect of high parent EA on the relation between parent ACEs, parent mental distress, and children's social–emotional problems.

Keywords

adverse childhood experiencesAmerican Indian/Alaska Nativechild social–emotional developmentemotional availabilityparent–child relationship
Type
Regular Articles
Information
Development and Psychopathology , Volume 32 , Issue 2 , May 2020 , pp. 425 - 436
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abidin, R. R. (1995). Parenting Stress Index (PSI) (3rd ed.) Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources.Google Scholar
Ainsworth, M. D. S., Blehar, M. C., Waters, E., & Wall, S. (1978). Patterns of attachment. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Altenhofen, S., Clyman, R., Little, C., Baker, M., & Biringen, Z. (2013). Attachment security in three-year-olds who entered substitute care in infancy. Infant Mental Health Journal, 34, 435–445. doi:10.1002/imhj.21401CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Baker, M., & Biringen, Z. (2012). Emotional attachment and emotional availability (EA) clinical screener predicts attachment Q sort attachment security in child care. Poster presented at the National Training Institute, Los Angeles, CA.Google Scholar
Baron, R. M., & Kenny, D. A. (1986). The moderator–mediator variable distinction in social psychological research: Conceptual, strategic, and statistical considerations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 51, 1173–1182.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Belsky, J., & Fearon, R. P. (2002). Infant–mother attachment security, contextual risk, and early development: A moderational analysis. Development and Psychopathology, 14, 293–310.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Biringen, Z. (2005). Training and reliability issues with the Emotional Availability Scales. Infant Mental Health Journal, 26, 404–405.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Biringen, Z. (2008). The Emotional Availability (EA) Scales 4th edition and the Emotional Attachment & Emotional Availability (EA2) Clinical Screener: Infancy/early childhood version; middle childhood/youth versions; therapist/interventionist manual; couple relationship manual (4th ed.), Boulder, CO: international Center for Excellence in Emotional Availability. Retrieved from http://www.emotionalavailability.comGoogle Scholar
Biringen, Z., Derscheid, D., Vliegen, N., Closson, L., & Easterbrooks, M. A. (2014). Emotional availability (EA): Theoretical background, empirical research using the EA scales, and clinical applications. Developmental Review, 34, 114–167. doi:10.1016/j.dr.2014.01.002CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Biringen, Z., Robinson, J., & Emde, R. (1998). Emotional Availability Scales (3th ed.). Unpublished manual for the EAS-training. Retrieved from http://www.emotionalavailability.comGoogle Scholar
Bohn, D. (2003). Lifetime physical and sexual abuse, substance abuse, depression, and suicide attempts among Native American women. Issues in Mental Health Nursing, 24, 333–352. doi:10.1080/01612840390160829CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss (Vol. 1). New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Bowlby, J. (1980). Attachment and loss (Vol. 2). New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Brockie, T. N., Dana-Sacco, G., Wallen, G. R., Wilcox, H. C., & Campbell, J. C. (2015). The relationship of adverse childhood experiences to PTSD, depression, poly-drug use and suicide attempt in reservation-based Native American adolescents and young adults. American Journal of Community Psychology, 55, 411–421. doi:10.1007/s10464-015-9721-3CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brown, S. M., & Ash, J. (2017). Parental history of adversity and greatly increased odds of child mental health problems: Linked state-level data from Colorado. In Brown, S. (Chair), Parental history of adversity (ACEs) and child psychopathology: Colorado State, Tribal and Early Head Start Data. Symposium conducted at Society for Research in Child Development, Austin, TX.Google Scholar
Carter, A. S., Briggs-Gowan, M. J., Jones, S. M. & Little, T. D. (2003). The Infant–Toddler Social and Emotional Assessment (ITSEA): Factor structure, reliability, and validity. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 31, 495–514.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2003). Injury mortality among American Indian & Alaska Native children and youth—United States, 1989–1998. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 52, 697–701.Google Scholar
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2013). CDC health disparities and inequalities report—United States, 2013. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 62, 1–189.Google Scholar
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2016). The ACE Study Survey Data [Unpublished data]. Atlanta, GA: US Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Google Scholar
Chapman, D. P., Whitfield, C. L., Felitti, V. J., Dube, S. R., Edwards, V. E., & Anda, R. F. (2004). Adverse childhood experiences and the risk of depressive disorders in adulthood. Journal of Affective Disorders, 82, 217–225. doi:10.1016/j.jad.2003.12.013CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cole, D. A., & Maxwell, S. E. (2003). Testing mediational models with longitudinal data: Questions and tips in the use of structural equation modeling. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 112, 558–577.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cook, T. D., & Campbell, D. T. (1979). Quasi-experimentation: Design and analysis issues. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.Google Scholar
Danese, A., & McEwen, B. S. (2012). Adverse childhood experiences, allostasis, allostatic load, and age-related disease. Physiology & Behavior, 106, 29–39. doi:10.1016/j.physbeh.2011.08.019CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dozier, M., Lindhiem, O., & Ackerman, J. P. (2005). Attachment and Biobehavioral Catch-Up: An intervention targeting empirically identified needs of foster infants. In Berlin, L., Ziv, Y., Amaya-Jackson, L., & Greenberg, M. T. (Eds.), Enhancing early attachments: Theory, research, intervention, and policy (pp. 178–194). New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Easterbrooks, M., Biesecker, G., & Lyons-Ruth, K. (2000). Infancy predictors of emotional availability in middle childhood: The roles of attachment security and maternal depressive symptomatology. Attachment and Human Development, 2, 170–187. doi:10.1080/14616730050085545CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Eaton, W. W., Muntaner, C., Smith, C., Tien, A., & Ybarra, M. (2004). Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale: Review and revision (CESD and CESD-R). In Maruish, M. E. (Ed.), The use of psychological testing for treatment planning and outcomes assessment. (Vol. 3, pp. 363–377). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Edwards, V. J., Holden, G. W., Felitti, V. J., & Anda, R. F. (2003). Relationship between multiple forms of childhood maltreatment and adult mental health in community respondents: Results from the adverse childhood experiences study. American Journal of Psychiatry, 160, 1453–1460. doi:10.1176/appi.ajp.160.8.1453CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Espinet, S. D., Jeong, J. J., Motz, M., Racine, N., Major, D., & Pepler, D. (2013). Multimodal assessment of the mother–child relationship in a substance-exposed sample: Divergent associations with the emotional availability scales. Infant Mental Health Journal, 34, 496–507.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Felitti, V. J., Anda, R. F., Nordenberg, D., Williamson, D. F., Spitz, A. M., Edwards, V., … Marks, J. S. (1998). Relationship of childhood abuse and household dysfunction to many of the leading causes of death in adults: The adverse childhood experiences (ACE) study. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 14, 245–248.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Foege, W. H. (1998). Adverse childhood experiences: A public health perspective. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 14, 354–355.Google ScholarPubMed
Frankel, K. A., Croy, C. D., Kubicek, L. F., Emde, R. N., Mitchell, C. M., & Spicer, P. (2014). Toddler socioemotional behavior in a Northern Plains Indian tribe: Associations with maternal psychosocial well-being. Infant Mental Health Journal, 35, 10–20. doi:10.1002/imhj.21422CrossRefGoogle Scholar
George, C., Kaplan, N., & Main, M. (1996). Adult Attachment Interview. Unpublished manual, Department of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Gone, J. P. (2007). “We never was happy living like a Whiteman”: Mental health disparities and postcolonial predicament in American Indian communities. American Journal of Community Psychology, 40, 290–300. doi:10.1007/s10464-007-9136-xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gone, J. P., & Trimble, J. E. (2012). American Indian and Alaska Native mental health: Diverse perspectives on enduring disparities. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 8, 131–160. doi:10.1146/annurev-clinpsy-032511-143127CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goodman, S. H., Rouse, M. H., Connell, A. M., Robbins Broth, M., Hall, C. M., & Heyward, D. (2011). Maternal depression and child psychopathology: A meta-analytic review. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 14, 1–27. doi:10.1007/s10567-010-0080-1CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Guajardo, N. R., Snyder, G., & Peterson, R. (2009). Relationships among parenting practices, parental stress, child behaviour, and children's social-cognitive development. Infant and Child Development, 18, 37–60. doi:10.1002/icd.578CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gutermuth Anthony, L., Anthony, B. J., Glanville, D. N., Naiman, D. Q., Waanders, C., & Shaffer, S. (2005). The relationships between parenting stress, parenting behaviour and preschoolers’ social competence and behaviour problems in the classroom. Infant and Child Development, 14, 133–154. doi:10.1002/icd.385CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hasket, M. E., Ahern, L. S., Ward, C. S., & Allaire, J. C. (2006). Factor structure and validity of the Parenting Stress Index—Short form. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 35, 302–312. doi:10.1207/s15374424jccp3502_14CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayes, A. F. (2013). Introduction to mediation, moderation, and conditional process analysis: A regression-based approach. New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Kenney, M. K., & Singh, G. K. (2016). Adverse childhood experiences among American Indian/Alaska Native children: The 2011–2012 National Survey of Children's Health. Scientifica, 2016, 1–14.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Klein, A. & Moosbrugger, H. (2000). Maximum likelihood estimation of latent interaction effects with the LMS method. Psychometrika, 65, 457–474.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kertes, D. A., Donzella, B., Talge, N. M., Garvin, M. C., van Ryzin, M. J. & Gunnar, M. G. (2009). Inhibited temperament and parent emotional availability differentially predict young children’s cortisol responses to novel social and non-social events. Developmental Psychobiology, 51, 521–532.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koss, M. P., Yuan, N. P., Dightman, D., Prince, R. J., Polacca, M., Sanderson, B., & Goldman, D. (2003). Adverse childhood experiences and alcohol dependence among seven Native American tribes. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 25. doi:10.1016/S0749-3797(03)00195-8CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lehman, E., Steier, A., Guidash, K., & Wanna, S. (2002). Predictors of compliance in toddlers: Child temperament, maternal personality and emotional availability. Early Child Development and Care, 172, 301–310. doi:10.1080/03004430212124CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Libby, A. M., Orton, H. D., Novins, D. K., Beals, J., Manson, S. M., & AI-SUPERPFP Team. (2005). Childhood physical and sexual abuse and subsequent depressive and anxiety disorders for two American Indian tribes. Psychological Medicine, 35, 329–340.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Libby, A. M., Orton, H. D., Novins, D. K., Spicer, P., Buchwald, D., Beals, J., … AI-SUPERPFP Team. (2004). Childhood physical and sexual abuse and subsequent alcohol and drug abuse disorders in two American-Indian tribes. Journal of Studies on Alcohol, 65, 74–83.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lieberman, A. F., Ippen, C. G., & Van Horn, P. (2006). Child-parent psychotherapy: 6-month follow-up of a randomized controlled trial. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 45, 913–918.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Little, C., & Carter, A. (2005). Negative emotional reactivity and regulation in 12-month-olds following emotional challenge: Contributions of maternal-infant emotional availability in a low-income sample. Infant Mental Health Journal, 26, 354–368. doi:10.1002/imhj.20055CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Little, T. D. (2013). Longitudinal structural equation modeling. New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Luthar, S. S., Cicchetti, D., & Becker, B. (2000). The construct of resilience: A critical evaluation and guidelines for future work. Child Development, 71, 543–562.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MacKinnon, D. P. (2008). Introduction to statistical mediation analysis. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
MacKinnon, D. P., Fairchild, A. J., & Fritz, M. S. (2007). Mediation analysis. Annual Review of Psychology, 58, 593–614.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Madigan, S., Bakermans-Kranenburg, M. J., van IJzendoorn, M. H., Moran, G., Pederson, D. R., & Benoit, D. (2006). Unresolved states of mind, anomalous parental behavior, and disorganized attachment. A review and meta-analysis of a transmisison gap. Attachment & Human Development, 8, 89–111.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Main, M., & Solomon, J. (1986). Discovery of an insecure-disorganized/disoriented attachment pattern. In Brazelton, T. B. & Yogman, M. W. (Eds.), Affective development in infancy (pp. 95–124). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.Google Scholar
Manson, S. M., Ackerson, L. M., Dick, R. W., Baron, A. E., & Fleming, C. M. (1990). Depressive symptoms among American Indian adolescents: Psychometric characteristics of the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). Psychological Assessment, 2, 231–237.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Martins, E. C., Soares, I., Martins, C., Terenod, S., & Osóriof, A. (2012). Can we identify emotion overregulation in infancy? Associations with avoidant attachment, dyadic emotional interaction and temperament. Infant and Child Development, 21, 579–595.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, S. E., & Cole, D. A. (2007). Bias in cross-sectional analyses of longitudinal mediation. Psychological Methods, 12, 23–44. doi:10.1037/1082-989X.12.1.23CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McDonnell, C. G., & Valentino, K. (2016). Intergenerational effects of childhood trauma: Evaluating pathways among maternal ACEs, perinatal depressive symptoms, and infant outcomes. Child Maltreatment, 21, 317–326.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Milan, S., Snow, S., & Belay, S. (2009). Depressive symptoms in mothers and children: Preschool attachment as a moderator of risk. Developmental Psychology, 45, 1019–1033. doi:10.1037/a0016164CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Muthén, L. K., & Muthén, B. O. (1998–2017). Mplus user's guide. (8th ed.). Los Angeles: Author.Google Scholar
Narayan, A. J., Kalstabakken, A. W., Labella, M. H., Nerenberg, L. S., Monn, A. R., & Masten, A. S. (2017). Intergenerational continuity of adverse childhood experiences in homeless families: Unpacking exposure to maltreatment versus family dysfunction. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 87, 3–14.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Orme, J. G., Reis, J., & Herz, E. J. (1986). Factorial and discriminant validity of the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression (CES-D) Scale. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 42, 28–33.3.0.CO;2-T>CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Radloff, L. S. (1997). The CES-D Scale: A self-report depression scale for research in the general population. Applied Psychological Measurement, 1, 385–401.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rutter, M. (2012). Resilience as a dynamic concept. Development and Psychopathology, 24, 335–344. doi:10.1017/S0954579412000028CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sarche, M. C., Croy, C. D., Big Crow, C., Mitchell, C. M., & Spicer, P. (2009). Maternal correlates of 2-year-old American Indian children's social-emotional development in a Northern Plains tribe. Infant Mental Health Journal, 30, 321–340. doi:10.1002/imhj.20217CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sarche, M., & Spicer, P. (2008). Poverty and health disparities for American Indian and Alaska Native children: Current knowledge and future prospects. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1136, 126–136. doi:10.1196/annals.1425.017CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Saunders, H., & Biringen, Z. (2017). The validity of the Emotional Attachment Zones Evaluation (EA-Z): Assessing attachment style through a lifespan observational tool. Unpublished manuscript.Google Scholar
Schleuter, L. J., Mendoza, M. M., Hurwich-Reiss, E., Barrow, E., Fisher, P., & Watamura, S. E. (2017). Parental history of adversity, current family functioning, and child outcomes. In Brown, S. (Chair), Parental history of adversity (ACEs) and child psychopathology: Colorado State, Tribal and Early Head Start Data. Symposium conducted at the Society for Research in Child Development, Austin, TX.Google Scholar
Shiels, M. S., Chernyavskiy, P., Anderson, W. F., Best, A. F., Haozous, E. A., Hartage, P., … de Gonzalez, A. B. (2017). Trends in premature mortality in the USA by sex, race, and ethnicity from 1999 to 2014: An analysis of death certificate data. Lancet, 389, 1043–1054. doi:10.1016/50140-6736(1730187-2CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Shonkoff, J. P., Boyce, W. T., & McEwen, B. S. (2009). Neuroscience, molecular biology, and the childhood roots of health disparities: Building a new framework for health promotion and disease prevention. Journal of the American Medical Association, 301, 2252–2259. doi:10.1001jama.2009.754CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Spitzer, R. L., Kroenke, K., Williams, J. B., & Löwe, B. (2006). A brief measure for assessing generalized anxiety disorder: The GAD-7. Archives of Internal Medicine, 166, 1092–1097. doi:10.1001/archinte.166.10.1092CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tavakol, M., & Dennick, R. (2011). Making sense of Cronbach's alpha. International Journal of Medical Education, 2, 53–55. doi:10.5116/ijme.4dfb.8dfdCrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Teti, D. M., Kim, B. K., Mayer, G., & Countermine, M. (2010). Maternal emotional availability at bedtime predicts infant sleep quality. Journal of Family Psychology, 24, 307–315. doi:10.1037/a0019306CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Whitbeck, L. B., McMorris, B. J., Hoyt, D. R., Stubben, J. D., & LaFramboise, T. (2002). Perceived discrimination, traditional practices, and depressive symptoms among American Indians in the upper midwest. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 43, 400–418.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
ZERO TO THREE (2005). Parent–Infant Ratings Global Assessment Scale (PIR-GAS). Diagnostic Classification of Mental Health and Developmental Disorders of Infancy and Early Childhood, Revised (DC:0-3R). Washington, DC: Author.Google Scholar