Parental Adverse Childhood Experiences and Adolescents’ Depressive Symptoms: Roles of Parenting Stress and Parent-child Attachment

Parental factors have a profound implication on adolescents’ depressive symptoms. Parents’ adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) shape their parenting, thus predicting the next generation’s mental health. This study explored the mediating role of parenting stress and parent-child attachment in the correlation between both paternal and maternal ACEs and adolescents’ depressive symptoms. Additionally, the study aimed to explore whether parental ACEs influence both one’s own and the partner’s parenting stress and attachment, ultimately predicting adolescent depressive symptoms. We recruited 533 Chinese families for this study. Fathers and mothers completed questionnaires assessing ACEs and parenting stress at Time 1. Adolescents (59.8% girls, M_age = 13.45 ± 0.78) completed a questionnaire on parent–child attachment at Time 2 and the questionnaire on depressive symptoms at both Time 2 and Time 3. We did not find the direct relationship between parental ACEs and adolescent depressive symptoms. However, both paternal and maternal ACEs were found to influence mother-child attachment through maternal, but not paternal, parenting stress and subsequently led to depressive symptoms in adolescents. Moreover, some specific pathways exhibited variations between genders. These findings highlight the vital influence of parenting stress and mother-child attachment in breaking the prediction of parental ACEs on adolescents’ depressive symptoms and underscore the importance of promoting positive mother-child interactions.