@article{ref1,
title="Mental health issues among caregivers of young children in rural China: prevalence, risk factors, and links to child developmental outcomes",
journal="International journal of environmental research and public health",
year="2021",
author="Zhang, Siqi and Wang, Lei and Xian, Yue and Bai, Yu",
volume="18",
number="1",
pages="e197-e197",
abstract="Previous research has found that there are high rates of mental health problems among caregivers in rural China and that caregiver mental health may be a  significant predictor of developmental delays among infants and toddlers in these  rural areas. In this paper, we use data from a survey of 986 caregiver-child pairs  in rural China to examine the risk factors of caregiver mental health and measure  the association between caregiver mental health and child development outcomes. To  conduct the empirical analysis, we assess caregiver mental health using the  Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 (DASS-21) questionnaire and measure child  developmental outcomes using the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Developmental  Third Edition (Bayley-III). The results show that 32% of caregivers have depressive  symptoms, 42% have anxiety symptoms, and 30% have symptoms of stress. The data also  demonstrate that caregiver identity and age as well as different measures of  socioeconomic status (SES) (characterized by caregiver education, father's  education, and household wealth) are all significantly linked to symptoms of  caregiver mental health problems. The analysis shows that caregiver depression,  anxiety, and/or stress are significantly associated with lower early childhood  development (ECD) outcomes in all areas measured (cognition, language,  social-emotion, and motor skills). The heterogeneous analysis demonstrates that  there are differences in the effects of caregiver mental health problems on ECD  among households are from families that are endowed with different levels of SES. On  the basis of the findings the study concludes that policymakers should pay more  attention to caregiver mental health problems in order to improve child  developmental outcomes in rural China. The study cannot, however, draw casual  conclusions and cannot rule out the possibility of recall bias when measuring  caregiver mental health, which may limit the external validity of the findings.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="1661-7827",
doi="10.3390/ijerph18010197",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18010197"
}