Calin, Maria Andreea;
(2024)
Maternal depressive symptoms and child emotional and behavioural problems: Evidence from the UK Millennium Cohort Study.
Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).
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Abstract
Numerous studies examined the association between postpartum maternal depression and child emotional and behavioural problems. This thesis extends this research by using data from the UK Millennium Cohort Study to assess the life course ‘accumulation model’ application to subthreshold depressive symptoms. The thesis comprises six chapters. The first chapter introduces the issues surrounding maternal depressive symptoms and their potential effects on children. The second chapter outlines the theoretical framework that informs the empirical work and details the data source used, the measures of depressive symptoms and child socio-emotional development. The empirical analysis comprises three interconnected chapters that build upon the introductory sections. The first chapter explores the various presentations and the markers of recurrent maternal depressive symptoms in early childhood. The results reveal that multiple socio-demographic characteristics surrounding childbirth increase the risk of recurrent symptoms in women, suggesting a cumulative effect of concurrent vulnerability markers. High self-esteem and social support demonstrate a protective effect. The subsequent chapter uses these findings to inform the modelling of emotional and behavioural problems, focusing on understanding their association with recurrent maternal depressive symptoms. The study finds that subclinical depressive symptoms, particularly when recurrent, heighten the risk of emotional and behavioural problems during childhood, with effects persisting into adolescence. Relevant confounding factors are also discussed. The third empirical chapter, recognising the reliance on maternal reports in the previous analysis, addresses the issue of parent-teacher discrepancies in children's emotional and behavioural ratings using a subsample of the data. This complex topic has received limited attention in previous research. The results indicate low to moderate agreement between informants at ages 7 and 11 and provide strong evidence that disparities between informants are associated with specific characteristics of the subjects and informants. In the final chapter, the thesis synthesises the findings, presents concluding remarks and provides suggestions for future research endeavours.
Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
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Qualification: | Ph.D |
Title: | Maternal depressive symptoms and child emotional and behavioural problems: Evidence from the UK Millennium Cohort Study |
Language: | English |
Additional information: | Copyright © The Author 2024. Original content in this thesis is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/). Any third-party copyright material present remains the property of its respective owner(s) and is licensed under its existing terms. Access may initially be restricted at the author’s request. |
UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education > IOE - Social Research Institute |
URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10202517 |
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