Intergenerational Adversity and Early Childhood Wellbeing: A Longitudinal Examination of Adversity's Developmental Consequences Among African-American and Latino Children

Background and Purpose: Early life experiences establish the foundation for a lifetime of physical and mental vitality and groundwork begins even before birth (Shonkoff, 2012), long before children become adults.  Adverse childhood experiences pose significant threats to this foundation and towards lifelong health as they create early social conditions that undermine development (Anda, Butchart, Felitti, & Brown, 2011). Exposures to childhood adversity take place within the context of the family where the biological and social interdependence of parents and children occur immediately upon birth. This study focused on this early socio-developmental context and examined the proximal effects of intergenerational adversities on child socio-emotional well-being during early periods of development (ages 1, 3, 5, and 9). Considering the changing ethnic/racial demographics of the U.S. population, this study compared these effects between African-American, White, and Latino mothers and children.

Methods:  Using four waves of longitudinal data from the Fragile Families and Child Well-being (FFCW) study (N=4,898) latent growth curve analysis was used to examine trajectories of early childhood socio-emotional well-being from age 1 to 9, and test the hypothesized effects of intergenerational adversity over time. The FFCW is a nationally representative sample of children in large U.S. urban cities and provides adequate statistical power for multiple group testing to examine differences between racial/ethnic groups. Latent measure includes socio-emotional well-being measured by the 12-item Emotionality and Shyness scale from the Emotionality, Activity, and Sociability Temperament Survey for Children (Mathiesen & Tambs, 1999). Intergenerational adversity was measured by summing the number of adversities experienced by the child’s biological parents (e.g. experiences of physical abuse, witnessing violence, health problems, financial insecurity, food insecurity). Maximum likelihood estimation was used to address missing data.

Results: Results indicated good model fit to the data. Findings demonstrated improved childhood socio-emotional well-being over time across ethnic/racial groups. It also showed significant negative association between intercept and slope, where children who exhibited lower levels of socio-emotional well-being at age one showed greater change in socio-emotional well-being over time. Finally, findings indicate intergenerational adversity as a significant predictor of early childhood socio-emotional well-being. Greater exposure to intergenerational adversity is associated with worse socio-emotional outcomes over time and stronger effects were observed among African-American children compared to their Latino and White counterparts.

Conclusions and Implications: Findings from this study suggest the importance of considering intergenerational adversity in the assessment and promotion of early childhood socio-emotional well-being.  They also point to the distinct vulnerability of children of color toward less favorable outcomes as they are at the intersection of health, racial disparities and multi-form adversities. The observed effects of intergenerational adversity early in childhood present a window of opportunity for social work interventions that help establish a strong early childhood foundation towards better youth and adult outcomes. Furthermore, racial/ethnic differences call for further investigation regarding potential racial/ethnic variations in pathways of intergenerational adversity towards socio-emotional health outcomes. Future research should include examining culturally specific protective factors to help identify targets of preventive interventions that are tailored to specific underserved population.