Grant: Travel Awards - Institute Community Support

Children of depressed parents are at an increased risk of depression, anxiety, behavioral, and other disorders. Possible reasons for the risk include genetic genetic heritability, stress, and negative parental affect and behaviors. Recent findings suggest that when the mother's depression improves, children have improved overall functioning and decreased rates of disorders, compared to mothers who do not get better or who relapse. There is limited information about whether improvements in father's depression have the same benefits. Method: Participants included 93 depressed parents (82 mothers and 11 fathers) who entered into a medication clinical trial for depression and 168 of their eligible offspring ages 7-17, assessed over 9 months by independent teams in Ottawa and New York. Detailed clinical information was obtained to examine how parents' remission status was related to child outcome. Results: In this sample, children of depressed fathers, compared to children of depressed mothers, had significantly less psychiatric disorders. Furthermore, mother's, but not fathers', remission was associated with a significant decrease in most child symptoms over time. However, children of depressed fathers showed a decrease in anxiety symptoms during father's treatment. Among the children of mothers who remitted, there was an association found between mother's remission and improved parenting behaviors that had a favorable impact on child's outcome. Conclusion: Children of depressed mothers may have higher rates of psychopathology than children of depressed fathers. Maternal remission is associated with significant improvements in children and better parenting functioning. Children of father's who remit may also show improvements, particularly a reduction in anxiety. Thus, rapid treatment of parental depression to remission and preventing relapse are important for improving child outcome.