Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 Jun 16;15(1):31.
doi: 10.1186/s13034-021-00385-3.

Mothers' daily perceived stress influences their children's mental health during SARS-CoV-2-pandemic-an online survey

Franziska Köhler-Dauner #  1 , Vera Clemens #  2 , Stephanie Lange  2 , Ute Ziegenhain  2 , Jörg M Fegert  2
Affiliations

Mothers' daily perceived stress influences their children's mental health during SARS-CoV-2-pandemic-an online survey

Franziska Köhler-Dauner et al. Child Adolesc Psychiatry Ment Health. .

Abstract

Background: The current situation caused by the SARS-CoV-2-pandemic is associated with serious losses for everyone and has been affecting social life, politics, the economy and the media worldwide. Preventive isolation and social distancing strategies have confronted families with a large number of different challenges. The current epidemic and quarantine restrictions have a verifiable influence on the emotional and social development of children and adolescents. During this ongoing situation children of parents, who already were mentally stressed, seem particularly at risk.

Objective: We aimed to assess the role of maternal daily perceived stress on children's mental health during the SARS-CoV-2-pandemic.

Methods: An online "SARS-CoV-2-pandemic survey" was developed to assess children's mental health since the beginning of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. To describe maternal perceived everyday stress, data from a longitudinal survey was utilized. Our survey includes elements and versions of the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire and the Perceived Stress Scale. We furthermore collected socio-demographic data. Due to our limited dependent variables we applied Tobit models for estimation.

Results: We found a positive and significant effect of the maternal perceived everyday stress on children's emotional problems during the pandemic. Furthermore, results provide empirical evidence for an increase of the children's hyperactivity level dependent on the mother's perceived stress before the SARS-COV-2 crisis. We could not find significant effects for the relationship between mother's perceived everyday stress and the children's behavioral problems.

Conclusions: Analyses illustrate the effects on children's mental distress during everyday life in the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Future research needs to identify influencing factors with regard to political, economic and social restrictions, in order to prevent children's mental health problems.

Keywords: Emotional and social development of children and adolescents; Life quality; Mental stress; Psychosocial impact; SARS-CoV-2-pandemic.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

VC states that she has no conflict of interests. FKD states that she has no conflict of interests. SL states that she has no conflict of interests. FK states that she has no conflict of interests. UZ states that she has no conflict of interests. JMF has received research funding from the EU DFG (German Research Foundation) BMG (Federal Ministry of Health) BMBF (Federal Ministry of Education and Research) BMFSFJ (Federal Ministry of Family Senior Citizens Women and Youth) G-BA Innovationsfonds several state ministries State Foundation Baden-Württemberg Volkswagen Foundation Porticus Foundation Diocese of Rottenburg-Stuttgart. Moreover he received travel grants honoraria and sponsoring for conferences and medical educational purposes from APK Deutschlandfunk DFG DJI DKSB Infectopharm med update UNICEF several universities professional associations political foundations and German federal and state ministries during the last 5 years. Every Grant and every honorarium has to be declared to the law office of the University Hospital Ulm. Professor Fegert holds no stocks of pharmaceutical companies.

References

    1. Meirhofer A, Peucker C, Pluto L, van Santen E, Seckinger M. Kinder-und Jugendhilfe in Zeiten der Corona-Pandemie. DJI-Jugendhilfeb@rometer bei Jugendämtern, München. 2020. https://www.dji.de/fileadmin/user_upload/bibs2020/1234_DJI-Jugendhilfeba.... Accessed 08 July 2020.
    1. Shen K, Yang Y, Wang T, Zhao D, Jiang Y, Jin R, Zheng Y, Xu B, Xie Z, Lin L, Shang Y, Lu X, Shu S, Bai Y, Deng J, Lu M, Ye L, Wang X, Wang Y, Gao L, et al. Diagnosis treatment and prevention Of 2019 novel coronavirus infection in children: experts’ consensus statement. World J Pediatr. 2020 doi: 10.1007/s12519-020-00343-7. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Fegert JM, Vitiello B, Plener PL, Clemens V. Challenges and burden of the coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic for child and adolescent mental health: a narrative review to highlight clinical and research needs in the acute phase and the long return to normality. Child Adolesc Psychiatry Ment Health. 2020;14:20. doi: 10.1186/s13034-020-00329-3. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Halvorsen E, Stamu-O'Brien C, Carniciu S, Jafferany M. Psychological effects of COVID-19 on parenting and maternal–fetal mental health. Dermatol Ther. 2020;33(4):e13579. doi: 10.1111/dth.13579. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Brooks SK, Webster RK, Smith LE, Woodland L, Wessely S, Greenberg N, Rubin GJ. The psychological impact of quarantine and how to reduce it: rapid review of the evidence. Lancet. 2020;395(10227):912–20. doi: 10.1016/s0140-6736(20)30460-8. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources