Parent Work-Life Conflict and Adolescent Adjustment During COVID-19: Mental Health and Parenting as Mediators

• Published in: Journal of family psychology Vol. 36; no. 3; pp. 325 - 336
• Main Authors: Wang, Cixin, Cheong, Yeram, Zhu, Qianyu, Havewala, Mazneen, Ye, Yijun
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Psychological Association 01-04-2022
• Subjects: Adjustment; Adolescent; Adolescents; Adult; Autonomy; Child, Preschool; Comorbidity; Conflict; Coronaviruses; COVID-19; Fathers; Female; Health behavior; Human; Humans; Indirect effects; Infant; Male; Mental Health; Middle schools; Mothers; Pandemics; Parent participation; Parent-Child Relations; Parental control; Parental Involvement; Parenting; Parenting - psychology; Parents & parenting; Parents - psychology; Student Engagement; Work; Work-Life Balance; Youth; COVID-19; covitality; academic engagement; mental health; work-life conflict
• ISSN: 0893-3200; 1939-1293
• DOI: 10.1037/fam0000948

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic is an unprecedented challenging time for parents and adolescents. The present study examines the role of parent work-life conflict on adolescent adjustment (i.e., academic engagement and mental health) and family processes (i.e., parental mental health and parenting) as potential mediators for this association. A total of 692 middle school students (53.2% boys; M
age = 13.54 years, SD
age = 0.58) and their parents (29.6% fathers and 70.4% mothers; M
age = 44.75 years, SD
age = 4.14 years) completed an online survey in May 2020 in Beijing, China. Results indicated that many parents (24.6%) experienced work-life conflicts amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Findings also showed that parent work-life conflict was negatively associated with youth academic engagement and mental health indirectly through parental mental health difficulties and parenting behavior (parental control, autonomy granting, and parental involvement). In addition, parental mental health difficulties had direct and indirect effects on youth adjustment via parenting behaviors, such that parental involvement and autonomy granting predicted greater academic engagement and covitality (co-occurrence of positive traits and positive mental health), whereas the parental control predicted youth mental health difficulties. Our findings extend prior research by examining the pathways linking parental work-life conflict to youth adjustment during COVID-19. Findings are discussed in terms of how to better support families and promote better youth academic engagement and well-being during COVID-19.