Midlife Children's and Older Mothers' Depressive Symptoms: Empathic Mother–Child Relationships as a Key Moderator

• Published date: 01 December 2020
• Author: Courtney A. Polenick,Yijung Kim,Nicole DePasquale,Kira S. Birditt,Steven H. Zarit,Karen L. Fingerman
• Date: 01 December 2020
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12466

C A. PUniversity of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor

Y KUniversity of Massachusett Boston

N DPDuke University School of Medicine

K S. BUniversity of Michigan, Ann Arbor

S H. ZThe Pennsylvania State University

K L. FThe University of Texas at Austin

Midlife Children’s and Older Mothers’ Depressive

Symptoms: Empathic Mother–Child Relationships

as a Key Moderator

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the

link between midlife children’s and older moth-

ers’ depressive symptoms, whether this link is

exacerbated in highly empathic mother–child

relationships (i.e., shared strong feelings of

being loved, cared for, and understood in the

mother–child tie), and whether these associa-

tions vary by children’s gender.

Background: Empathic mother–child relation-

ships in later life may intensify the link between

midlife children’sand older mothers’ depressive

symptoms. Yetlittle is known about the emotional

implications of the mother–child tie for midlife

daughters and sons.

Method: The sample included 234 midlife

children (M=49.75years) and their mothers

(M=75.27years) from Wave 1 of the Fam-

ily Exchanges Study. Linear regressions were

Department of Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann

Arbor, 4250 Plymouth Road, Ann Arbor, MI 48109

(cpolenic@med.umich.edu).

Key Words: intergenerational, mother–child relationship,

parent–child relations, relationshipquality.

estimated to determine the link between midlife

children’s and older mothers’ depressive symp-

toms and the potential moderating role of highly

empathic mother–child relationships.

Results: Midlife children had greater depres-

sive symptoms when their mothers had greater

depressive symptoms in the context of highly

empathic mother–child relationships. This asso-

ciation was not moderated by children’s gender.

Conclusion: These ndings underscore the

enduring emotional salience of the mother–child

tie and emphasize the importance of relation-

ship characteristics that may heighten the link

between midlife children’s and their mothers’

depressive symptoms.

Implications: Interventions to prevent or treat

depressive symptoms among midlife adults may

benet from accounting for the role that their

mothers’ depressive symptoms might play in

maintaining these symptoms, particularly when

mother–child ties are highly empathic.

The mother–child relationship is one of the

most important and long-standing ties in each

Family Relations 69 (December 2020): 1073–10861073

DOI:10.1111/fare.12466