Journal Article

A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Parental Depression, Antidepressant Usage, Antisocial Personality Disorder, and Stress and Anxiety as Risk Factors for Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in Children

Barry, Caroline M., Cerles, Audrey, Kaminski, Jennifer W., Holbrook, Joseph R., Ko, Jean, Bitsko, Rebecca H., Saadeh, Kayla, MacMillan, Laurel, Bloomfield, Jeanette, Mahmooth, Zayan, O’Masta, Brenna, Robinson, Lara R., Maher, Brion, Rush, Margaret

2024

Overview

Poor parental mental health and stress have been associated with children’s mental disorders, including attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), through social, genetic, and neurobiological pathways. To determine the strength of the associations between parental mental health and child ADHD, we conducted a set of meta-analyses to examine the association of parent mental health indicators (e.g., parental depression, antidepressant usage, antisocial personality disorder, and stress and anxiety) with subsequent ADHD outcomes in children. Eligible ADHD outcomes included diagnosis or symptoms. Fifty-eight articles published from 1980 to 2019 were included. We calculated pooled effect sizes, accounting for each study’s conditional variance, separately for test statistics based on ADHD as a dichotomous (e.g., diagnosis or clinical cutoffs) or continuous measurement (e.g., symptoms of ADHD subtypes of inattentiveness and hyperactivity/impulsivity). Parental stress and parental depression were significantly associated with increased risk for ADHD overall and both symptoms and diagnosis. Specifically, maternal stress and anxiety, maternal prenatal stress, maternal depression, maternal post-partum depression, and paternal depression were positively associated with ADHD. In addition, parental depression was associated with symptoms of ADHD inattentive and hyperactive/impulsive subtypes. Parental antisocial personality disorder was also positively associated with ADHD overall and specifically ADHD diagnosis. Prenatal antidepressant usage was associated with ADHD when measured dichotomously only. These findings raise the possibility that prevention strategies promoting parental mental health and addressing parental stress could have the potential for positive long-term impacts on child health, well-being, and behavioral outcomes.

• Publisher: Springer US,Springer Nature B.V
• Subject: Antidepressants / Antidepressive Agents - therapeutic use / Antisocial behavior / Antisocial personality disorder / Antisocial Personality Disorder - epidemiology / Anxiety / Anxiety - drug therapy / Anxiety - epidemiology / Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity - epidemiology / Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder / Behavior Disorders / Behavior Problems / Brain / Child / Child and School Psychology / Child Development / Child Health / Child Rearing / Children / Childrens health / Conceptual Tempo / Copyrights / Depression (Psychology) / Depression - drug therapy / Depression - epidemiology / Developmental Disabilities / Disease Control / Disorders / Environmental Influences / Family Environment / Family Problems / Genetics / Health behavior / Health education / Health indicators / Health promotion / Health Psychology / Health status / Humans / Hyperactivity / Impulsivity / Maternal depression / Maternal stress / Measurement / Medical diagnosis / Medicine / Medicine & Public Health / Mental depression / Mental disorders / Mental health / Meta Analysis / Mothers / Parent Caregiver Relationship / Parent-child relations / Parental depression / Parental stress / Parents & parenting / Parents - psychology / Paternal depression / Personality / Personality disorders / Personality Problems / Postpartum depression / Postpartum period / Prevention / Preventive medicine / Public Health / Risk Factors / Statistics / Stress / Stress, Psychological - epidemiology / Symptoms / Systematic review / Well being