Parent factors associated with anxiety in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder
Year: 2011
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Around 25% of children with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (AD/HD) have an anxiety disorder (Tannock, 2000), and children with AD/HD are three times more likely than children in the general population to have an anxiety disorder (Angold, Costello, & Erkanli, 1999). Past research has identified negative or controlling parenting practices, parental psychopathology, child externalizing symptoms, and child educational difficulties as potential risk factors for anxiety in children with AD/HD. However, the mechanisms underlying the relation between AD/HD and anxiety are unclear. The goal of this study was to further examine the parent factors related to symptoms of anxiety in children with AD/HD. It was hypothesized that parental symptoms of AD/HD and inconsistent parenting practices would predict symptoms of anxiety in children with AD/HD. Child perceptions of control were also hypothesized to moderate the relation between parenting practices and child anxiety symptoms. The participants for the study included 28 children between the ages of 8 and 15 who had been diagnosed with AD/HD and at least one parent. A logistic regression analysis indicated that maternal psychopathology predicted a diagnosis of social phobia. Post-hoc analyses also indicated that mothers of children with AD/HD and social phobia had more symptoms of AD/HD than parents of children with AD/HD only. These findings have implications for theoretical understandings of AD/HD with comorbid anxiety, future research, and clinical practice with families of children with AD/HD.
Author: Sarah O’Rourke
Language: English
Subfield: Psychiatry and Mental health
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1939545743