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The Relationship between Parental Efficacy and Depressive Symptoms in a Diverse Sample of Low Income Mothers

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Abstract

We examined the relationship between parental efficacy and depressive symptoms in a diverse sample of low income mothers. The sample consisted of 607 European American, African American, and Hispanic mothers who participated in The Early Steps Project, a multi-site, longitudinal, preventative intervention study. Parental efficacy was found to be significantly associated with depressive symptoms in the entire sample of low income mothers. Ethnicity moderated results, however, such that parental efficacy was significantly associated with depressive symptoms for European American mothers but was not for the African American and Hispanic mothers. Ethnic differences in the various categories of depressive symptoms (i.e., total, somatic, and psychological) were also explored, with the results showing that African American mothers reported higher levels of depressive symptoms than both European American and Hispanic mothers in each of the categories. The theoretical and clinical implications of these results are discussed.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Amori Yee Mikami, Ph.D., and Sarah K. Galloway, M.A., for their detailed and thoughtful suggestions on earlier versions of the manuscript, and Jennifer E. Cruz, M.A., for statistical assistance. Also, we thank Paul S. Strand, Ph.D., and anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments. This study was funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) Grants # RO1DA-16110 and 1RO1 DA022772-01A2. Portions of this paper were presented at the 2007 Black Graduate Conference in Psychology, Washington, DC.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Virginia, Box 400400, Charlottesville, VA, 22904-4400, USA

    Jennifer O’Neil & Melvin N. Wilson

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    Daniel S. Shaw

  3. Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, USA

    Thomas J. Dishion

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  1. Jennifer O’Neil
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  2. Melvin N. Wilson
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  4. Thomas J. Dishion
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Correspondence to Jennifer O’Neil.

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O’Neil, J., Wilson, M.N., Shaw, D.S. et al. The Relationship between Parental Efficacy and Depressive Symptoms in a Diverse Sample of Low Income Mothers. J Child Fam Stud 18, 643–652 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-009-9265-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-009-9265-y

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