Maternal Depressive Symptoms and Black Children's Functioning: Early Care and Education As a Protective Resource

Background and Purpose: Research has established the impact of maternal depressive symptoms on children’s development. However, too little is known about links between maternal depressive symptoms and children’s development and learning, as well as protective factors against negative outcomes, among Black families across the socioeconomic spectrum. Research suggests that early care and education (ECE) settings have the potential to bridge opportunity gaps for children across disparate social, economic, and racial backgrounds. Thus, ECE may serve as a particularly potent counterforce for Black children whose mothers report depressive symptoms, given their cumulative exposure to stressors as a function of their marginalized social status and their experiences of threats to their mental health. Informed by life course models of human development, bioecological theories of human development, and the integrative model for the study of developmental competencies in minority children, this study examines (1) the burden of maternal depression among a heterogeneous sample of Black mothers drawn from a national sample, (2) associations between maternal depressive symptoms and children’s school readiness skills, and (3) the extent to which ECE teacher characteristics may serve as a buffer between maternal depressive symptoms and less optimal outcomes for children.

Methods: This study employs data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort (ECLS-B). The ECLS-B is a multi-source, multi-method, nationally representative longitudinal study of a cohort of approximately 10,700 U.S.-born children. A series of no constant regression analyses tested for significant differences in the mean levels of depressive symptomology poverty status, maternal educational attainment, maternal employment status, and marital status. A series of OLS regression models regressed children’s kindergarten reading skills, math skills, and externalizing behaviors on maternal depressive symptoms. Propensity score weighting was incorporated, in which the propensity of mothers to experience depressive symptoms was estimated with logistic regression models as a function of the observed, pretreatment (prior to assessment of maternal depressive symptoms) covariates. The extent to which ECE experiences might attenuate links between maternal depressive symptoms and Black children’s functioning was assessed by including interaction terms between ECE characteristics and maternal depressive symptoms in the series of three OLS models predicting children’s outcomes.

Results: Maternal depressive symptoms at 24 months predicted children’s math skills at kindergarten; no association emerged with reading skills or behavioral functioning. Teacher ECE credentials emerged as particularly promotive for children whose mothers reported experiencing depressive symptoms.

Conclusions and Implications: Because maternal depression can adversely impact maternal, child, and family outcomes, implementing policies and programs to support mothers and their families with regards to mental health is important during the critical years of early childhood. ECE settings may be an area where additional supports for children and their families can be implemented, underscoring the need for equitable access to high-quality and affirming early learning environments for Black children. Incentivizing continuing education that promotes skills to engage with children whose caretakers are experiencing mental health challenges that, consequently, impact children’s functioning may be an effective support mechanism.