Beyond the Child: Associations of Children’s and Parents’ Executive Functioning and ADHD Traits with Parenting Stress and Family Dysfunction

Abstract

Executive functioning, and its associated behavioural correlates of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) traits, have been associated with a number of aspects of psychosocial functioning for both children and adults. Previous work has focused largely on the associations of children’s executive functioning and ADHD traits with psychosocial variables within the family unit – namely parenting stress (an individual-level factor) and general family dysfunction (a family-level factor). In contrast, the influence of parents’ executive functioning and ADHD traits, and the interaction of children and parent factors, have received less attention in the research literature in predicting these psychosocial variables. Methodological limitations of the extant literature also included a relative reliance on questionnaire-report of executive functioning, leaving open questions about whether associations between executive functioning and psychosocial variables were based on true underlying deficits in executive functioning (as tapped by performance-based measures), or rather difficulties in the application of executive functioning skills in the daily context (reflected in questionnaire-based measures). Moreover, to my knowledge no work in the executive functioning literature had explored possible differences in these associations across children’s developmental stages, nor had previous work focused on using non-clinical samples to allow for increased generalizability of results (with most existing work having occurred within clinical populations). The overarching goal of my dissertation was to address these gaps by exploring associations between parents’/children’s executive functioning (including both performance- and questionnaire-based measures) and ADHD traits, and psychosocial factors within non-clinically recruited families. Studies conducted with three samples were used to address these research goals. Parents of children aged 3 to 5 years (preschool-aged online sample; N = 93), 6 to 17 years (school-aged online sample; N = 113), and 8 to 17 years (school-aged community sample; N = 52) were recruited. Through completion of parent-report questionnaires (all samples), as well as computerized measures of various aspects of executive functioning (community sample), a number of findings emerged. First, weaker executive functioning in children (online preschool-aged and school-aged children) and parents (questionnaire-based; all samples), as well as a smaller working memory capacity in mothers (computer-based; school-aged community sample), were associated with higher self-reported parenting stress. The association between executive functioning and parenting stress held even after controlling for parents’ general stress levels, providing evidence that this association pertains uniquely to stress associated with the parenting role. While there was limited evidence of any interaction effects between children’s and parents’ (questionnaire-based) executive functioning, preliminary findings from the preschool-aged online sample suggested that parents experience higher levels of parenting stress if their own executive functioning is weaker; however, if their own executive functioning is stronger, they will still experience elevated parenting stress if their child has weaker executive functioning. Second, analyses revealed that it was traits of ADHD in parents – and not their children – that were associated with parenting stress, further highlighting the importance of parent-level factors in understanding parenting stress. Third, and with respect to general family dysfunction, a different picture emerged such that this variable was primarily associated with parent-level factors including their executive functioning and ADHD traits. No evidence emerged for an association of children’s executive functioning or ADHD traits with general family dysfunction. Although not a primary focus, evidence across analyses exploring both aspects of psychosocial functioning also emerged to suggest that higher levels of children’s aggression was associated with worse psychosocial functioning within families. There was no evidence to suggest that associations between executive functioning and either psychosocial variable differed based on children’s developmental level. Taken together, these results have important theoretical and applied implications related to assessment methodology and understanding psychosocial functioning within families in both research and clinical settings.