Maternal Psychological Control, Use of Supportive Parenting, and Childhood Depressive Symptoms

Given the developmental importance of the family system, research on child depressive symptoms often examines the impact of parenting practices as either sources of or buffers against depressive symptoms. The current study, operating from a stress-process framework, examined the interactive effects of supportive parenting practices (i.e., mothers' use of positive communication, positive parenting, and parental involvement) and maternal psychological control on mother- and child-reported child depressive symptoms in a community-recruited sample of 9-12 year-olds. Discrepancies between mother- and child-reports of depressive symptoms were also examined. Maternal psychological control was uniquely associated with child-, not mother-, reported depressive symptoms. Parental involvement was uniquely associated with mother-, not child-, reported depressive symptoms. Positive parent-child communication was associated with less child- and mother-reported child depressive symptoms at the bivariate level, but not when unique associations were examined. Positive parenting was unrelated to either report of depressive symptoms. No interaction effects were detected. Implications and future directions are discussed.