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Perceived Peer Victimization Predicts Anxiety Outcomes in a Prevention Program for Offspring of Anxious Parents.

ABSTRACT: Offspring of anxious parents are at heightened risk for developing anxiety disorders. Preventive interventions for these youths are promising but not universally effective, creating a need to identify outcome predictors. Peer experiences (e.g., peer victimization, social support) are associated with youth anxiety trajectories but have been relatively unexplored in this context. Thus, this study tested whether peer experiences predicted anxiety-related outcomes in families participating in a randomized controlled trial of a child anxiety prevention program for families with a clinically anxious parent. Parental anxiety severity was also examined as a moderator of relations between peer experiences and subsequent child anxiety. Participants were 121 families (child M age = 8.69, 55.90% girls). Hierarchical logistic and linear regressions were used to test whether baseline peer-related factors predicted increased anxiety symptom severity and anxiety disorder onset over 12 months. Youths reporting greater perceived peer victimization at baseline were more likely to develop an anxiety disorder and had more severe anxiety symptoms 12 months later. Lower social support from classmates also predicted increased anxiety severity, but this effect became nonsignificant after accounting for peer victimization. Further, parental anxiety severity moderated the peer victimization-child anxiety severity link: Higher child-reported peer victimization predicted increased anxiety in offspring of highly and moderately anxious but not low anxious parents. Children's reports of peer victimization appear important for understanding which youth may not respond to preventive interventions in high-risk families-especially for children with more severely anxious parents. Implications for the focus of selective anxiety prevention programs are discussed.

SUBMITTER: Schleider JL

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6237653 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Perceived Peer Victimization Predicts Anxiety Outcomes in a Prevention Program for Offspring of Anxious Parents.

Schleider Jessica L JL Ginsburg Golda S GS Drake Kelly K

Journal of clinical child and adolescent psychology : the official journal for the Society of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, American Psychological Association, Division 53 20170201 sup1

Offspring of anxious parents are at heightened risk for developing anxiety disorders. Preventive interventions for these youths are promising but not universally effective, creating a need to identify outcome predictors. Peer experiences (e.g., peer victimization, social support) are associated with youth anxiety trajectories but have been relatively unexplored in this context. Thus, this study tested whether peer experiences predicted anxiety-related outcomes in families participating in a rand ...[more]

PMID: 28145769

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Project description:BackgroundOffspring of patients with anxiety or depression are at high risk for developing anxiety or depression. Despite the positive findings regarding effectiveness of prevention programs, recruitment for prevention activities and trials is notoriously difficult. Our randomized controlled prevention trial was terminated due to lack of patient inclusion. Research on mentally-ill parents' perceptions of offspring's risk and need for preventive intervention may shed light on this issue, and may enhance family participation in prevention activities and trials.MethodsQualitative data were collected through semi-structured interviews with 24 parents (patients with anxiety or depression, or their partners). An inductive content analysis of the data was performed. Five research questions were investigated regarding parents' perceptions of anxiety, depression, and offspring risk; anxiety, depression, and parenting; the need for offspring intervention and prevention; and barriers to and experiences with participation in preventive research.ResultsParental perceptions of the impact of parental anxiety and depression on offspring greatly differed. Parents articulated concerns about children's symptomatology, however, most parents did not perceive a direct link between parent symptoms and offspring quality of life. They experienced an influence of parental symptoms on family quality of life, but chose not to discuss that with their children in order to protect them. Parents were not well aware of the possibilities regarding professional help for offspring and preferred parent-focused rather than offspring-focused interventions such as parent psycho-education. Important barriers to participation in preventive research included parental overburden, shame and stigma, and perceived lack of necessity for intervention.ConclusionsThis study highlights the importance of educating parents in adult health care. Providing psycho-education regarding offspring risk, communication in the family, and parenting in order to increase parental knowledge and parent-child communication, and decrease guilt and shame are important first steps in motivating parents to participate in preventive treatment.

Dataset Information

Perceived Peer Victimization Predicts Anxiety Outcomes in a Prevention Program for Offspring of Anxious Parents.

Publications

Perceived Peer Victimization Predicts Anxiety Outcomes in a Prevention Program for Offspring of Anxious Parents.

Similar Datasets

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