Economic strain and children's behavior in the aftermath of the great recession

Abstract

Families across the income spectrum experienced subjective feelings of economic strain during the Great Recession. Existing evidence suggests that much of that economic strain did not arise from individual-specific economic shocks, such as unemployment or income loss, as much as it did from worry and uncertainty about the future. The authors tested a model in which a measure of subjective perceptions of economic strain was the key predictor of children's behavior problems and objective indicators of economic experiences were treated as control variables. To do so, they used new data from a population-based sample of children ages 4-17 (N=303) living in southeast Michigan during the period 2009-2012. They found that economic strain exhibited a qualitatively large independent association with internalizing behavior problems for White-but not Black-children. This association was statistically significant over and above objective indicators of economic experiences and the family psychosocial context. © National Council on Family Relations, 2014.