Mothers’ Depressive Symptoms and Heavy Alcohol Use on Children’s Internalizing and Externalizing Behaviors

Introduction. Children of mothers who experience internalizing and externalizing behaviors are at a heightened risk for developing these behaviors themselves. In particular, mothers’ depressive symptoms (an internalizing behavior) and heavy alcohol use (an externalizing behavior) have been identified as contributing to the development of internalizing and externalizing behaviors in childhood. However, little is known about the influence of these maternal behaviors across children’s internalizing and externalizing behaviors during early adolescence. In this study we uniquely examine the role of mothers’ depressive symptoms and heavy alcohol use on early adolescent internalizing and externalizing behaviors.

Method. Data from 459 mother-child dyads participating in the Rochester Intergenerational Study, a longitudinal study designed to investigate the development of problem behaviors for children and adolescents, were used. Multilevel models (measurement occasions nested in mother-child dyad) were specified to examine the effect of mothers’ depressive symptoms (CESD) and mothers’ heavy alcohol use (number of times she drank until intoxicated or drank 5 or more drink in one setting) on mothers’ report of children’s internalizing and externalizing behaviors as measured by the CBCL each year from child age 10 years to age 15 years. Growth models of children’s CBCL scores were specified, and mothers’ alcohol use and depressive symptoms were considered as time-varying covariates.

Results. Mothers’ alcohol use had a statistically significant, but small effect on children’s internalizing behaviors (proportion of variance explained at level 1 < 1%, at level 2 = 3.3%) and externalizing behaviors (proportion of variance explained at level 1 < 1%, at level 2 = 3.0%) across early adolescence. Mothers’ depressive symptoms had a statistically significant and substantially larger (as compared to her alcohol use) effect on children’s internalizing behaviors (proportion of variance explained at level 1 = 2.2%, at level 2 = 22.4%) and externalizing behaviors (proportion of variance explained at level 1 = 2.6%, at level 2 = 29.0%) across this developmental period.

Conclusions. Although mothers’ heavy alcohol use and depressive symptoms were associated with both internalizing and externalizing behaviors of children across early adolescence, depressive symptoms demonstrated a substantially larger effect. Additional research is needed to examine the processes by which these contribute to adolescent development; however, these findings have notable implications for preventing heavy alcohol and treating symptoms of depression among mothers for not only the optimization of her own health, but for the positive development of her child.