Labored Love: Examining the Link Between Maternal Depression and Parenting Behaviors

Theoretical perspectives suggest a strong link between maternal mental health and parenting, which may facilitate the intergenerational transmission of disadvantage from depressed mothers to their children. In this paper, I extend prior research by using data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 3,659). OLS and random-effects regression models document a strong link between maternal depression and the following parenting behaviors: neglect, psychological aggression, physical assault, engagement, and parenting stress. Fixed-effects models, however, show that maternal depression is only predictive of neglect and parenting stress, suggesting some negative consequences of depression is driven by variation across individuals or unobserved time-invariant characteristics. Further, the association between depression and neglect is weaker among married than unmarried mothers, providing some evidence that marriage is protective.