Childhood maltreatment, parenting style and anxiety in Chinese youths: A case-control study

Lin Chen; Jin Lu; Qiongxian Li; Yuanyu Shi; Shuqing Liu; Yandie He; Guiqing Zheng; Yi Xiang; Yuanyuan Xiao

doi:10.1016/j.chiabu.2024.106807

Childhood maltreatment, parenting style and anxiety in Chinese youths: A case-control study

Child Abuse Negl. 2024 Apr 26:153:106807. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2024.106807. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Lin Chen¹, Jin Lu², Qiongxian Li¹, Yuanyu Shi¹, Shuqing Liu¹, Yandie He¹, Guiqing Zheng¹, Yi Xiang¹, Yuanyuan Xiao³

Affiliations

¹ NHC Key Laboratory of Drug Addiction Medicine, Division of Epidemiology and Health Statistics, School of Public Health, Kunming Medical University, Kunming, Yunnan, China.
² Psychiatry Department, The First Affiliated Hospital, Kunming Medical University, Kunming, Yunnan, China; Mental Health Institute of Yunnan, The First Affiliated Hospital, Kunming Medical University, Kunming, Yunnan, China; Yunnan Clinical Research Center for Mental Health, Kunming, Yunnan, China.
³ NHC Key Laboratory of Drug Addiction Medicine, Division of Epidemiology and Health Statistics, School of Public Health, Kunming Medical University, Kunming, Yunnan, China; Key Library in Public Health and Disease Prevention and Control, Yunnan Provincial Department of Education, China. Electronic address: 33225647@qq.com.

PMID: 38677178
DOI: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2024.106807

Abstract

Background: Although evidence in supporting the associations between childhood maltreatment (CM), parenting style and anxiety in children and adolescents exists, few high-quality analytical epidemiological studies which focusing on clinically diagnosed anxiety disorders (AD) had been published.

Objective: The aim of this study was to further corroborate the associations between CM, parenting style, and AD in a large representative sample of Chinese children and adolescents.

Participants and setting: Study subjects were derived from the Mental Health Survey for Children and Adolescents in Yunnan (MHSCAY), a population-based cross-sectional program.

Methods: Individually matched case-control study design was adopted. Univariate and multivariate conditional binary logistic regression models were used to estimate the associations between CM, parenting style and AD. Dose-response trends were estimated using the Cochran-Armitage Chi-square test. A series of stratified analyses were conducted to explore effect modification on exposure-outcome association by some important features.

Results: Totally we screened out 202 cases and 404 matched controls, with an age mean of 14.43 years. Conditional logistic regression models revealed that EA and a higher level of parental over-protection were significantly associated with increased risk of AD, with adjusted ORs of 3.39 (95 % CI: 2.07-5.56) and 1.93 (95 % CI: 1.28-2.90). Stratified analysis identified noticeable effect modification by sex, age, and whether the only child in the family.

Conclusions: Major findings of this study suggested that children and adolescents who had experienced EA or raised up by over-protective parents are at increased risk of AD. Targeted intervention measures should be developed and implemented for these high-risk youths.

Keywords: Anxiety disorders; Case-control study; Childhood maltreatment; Parenting style.