Presentations and discussion by 3-4 experts on a particular topic. A discussant integrates and summarizes the papers, develops implications for policy and practice from the research, and facilitates audience discussion. Papers listed below are included in this session.

Discussant: Sharon Ballard
Chairs: Anisa M. Zvonkovic, Shannon Weaver

Summary
This symposium includes four national studies, three longitudinal, with focus upon emotion regulation and social support’s importance for parent mental health. Paper 1 reports that stressor appraisal and coping strategies predicted parents’ posttraumatic stress symptoms over a 60 day period. Paper 2, with data collected 8 months apart during periods of restriction and case increases, tested relationships between parents sustained and increasing overload with mental health outcomes as moderated by emotion regulation and behavioral strategies. Paper 3 explains how social support buffered associations between parental stress and Covid-19 difficulties; these difficulties mediated the relation of stress to competence. Paper 4 found parent stress “spills over;” such stress along with family conflict predicted perceived child stress and emotional negativity. The discussant will comment on implications for family life education efforts to promote parent and child well-being while families continue to navigate the ongoing demands from, and long-term impacts of, the pandemic.

Objectives

• To share current information about influences upon parent’s post traumatic stress symptoms, anxiety, and depression.
• To highlight how emotion regulation, coping behaviors, and social support can act as direct and indirect influences upon parents’mental health as well as how parent stress and family conflict can impact child well-being as well.
• To provide ideas for how these findings linking emotion regulation and social support with mental health can be used in educational and intervention efforts with families.

Subject Codes: COVID-19, mental health, parenting
Population Codes: inclusive of adults, U.S., communities, general
Method and Approach Codes: longitudinal research, mediation/indirect effects models, quantitative methodology