Peer-reviewed article
Longitudinal associations between parental trauma-related symptoms and adolescent emotion regulation: a three-wave dyadic analysis
Shooroq Mabreah, Mohammed Abu Al-Rub ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-sonnet-5-5This study followed 247 parent–adolescent pairs from Syrian refugee and Jordanian host-community families in Jordan over six months, with three rounds of data collection. It looked at how parents' trauma-related symptoms and adolescents' difficulties managing emotions relate to each other over time. Parents' trauma at the start predicted adolescents' emotion regulation difficulties at the second wave, and this link ran partly through the parent's own emotion regulation difficulties. Adolescents' difficulties also predicted later parent difficulties, but only in the short term. The authors suggest that interventions should involve both parent and adolescent rather than treating the adolescent alone.
Key points
- 247 parent–adolescent dyads from Syrian refugee and Jordanian host-community families completed three waves over six months.
- Parental trauma at T1 predicted adolescent ER difficulties at T2 (β = 0.23).
- The link was mediated longitudinally by parent ER at T2.
- Adolescent ER at T1 predicted parent ER at T2 (β = 0.12), but this effect did not persist to T3.
- Refugee status did not moderate the transmission paths.
Limitations
The abstract describes an observational study over only six months, so it cannot show long-term effects or establish cause. Parental trauma was measured once as lifetime trauma, and the abstract does not say how well the results apply beyond these families in Jordan.
Abstract
Introduction Intergenerational trauma research has often treated transmission as unidirectional and static, overlooking dyadic and reciprocal processes. This study applied a three-wave longitudinal Actor–Partner Interdependence Model (APIM) to examine bidirectional associations between parental trauma-related symptoms and adolescent emotion regulation (ER) difficulties. Methods A total of 247 parent–adolescent dyads from Syrian refugee and Jordanian host-community families in Jordan completed three waves over six months. Parents reported lifetime trauma at T1; both parents and adolescents reported ER difficulties at T1, T2, and T3. Distinguishable-dyad APIMs estimated autoregressive, actor, and partner effects with FIML and covariates. Results Parental trauma at T1 significantly predicted offspring ER difficulties at T2 (β = 0.23), mediated longitudinally by parent ER at T2. Offspring ER at T1 also predicted parent ER at T2 (β = 0.12), but this child-driven effect did not persist to T3. Refugee status did not moderate the transmission paths. Discussion Intergenerational trauma appears to operate as a dynamically co-constructed dyadic process. Findings support process-focused, dyadic interventions rather than treating adolescents in isolation.