Peer-reviewed article
Parent conversations with young children: Implications for child well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Shannon Dier, Rachel B. Thibodeau‐Nielsen, Francisco Palermo, Alaina W. Dooley, María Fernanda Rueda-Posada et al. ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study examined how parents talked with young children (aged 3-6) about the COVID-19 pandemic and whether these conversations affected children's emotional distress. The research found that while most parents explained pandemic changes to their children, fewer offered emotional support. Interestingly, certain types of conversations—particularly those emphasizing that COVID-19 was dangerous—actually increased the link between parents' own stress and children's emotional distress, rather than protecting children.
Key points
- 205 parents of children aged 3-6 reported on pandemic-related conversations in fall 2020
- Talk about mitigation strategies was frequent, but fewer parents communicated emotional support
- Conversations about pandemic changes and danger explanations strengthened the association between parent stress and child emotional distress
- Self-protective explanations (focusing on safety measures) were associated with lower child emotional distress
- Parent stress was linked to increased child emotional distress, moderated by conversation type
Limitations
The study is cross-sectional, measuring parent and child responses at a single point in time, which prevents conclusions about causation or long-term effects. The sample was predominantly White (56.6%) and limited to the US, restricting generalizability to other populations and contexts.
Abstract
Parent-child conversations may minimize the impact of stressful situations on children's well-being. Parents were encouraged to talk with their children about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, yet research suggests that parent stress in response to the pandemic was associated with disruptions in parenting and increased child emotional distress. In the present study, 205 parents of children aged 3-6 years (50.7% girls, 56.6% White) reported on conversations about the pandemic and responded to measures of parent stress and child emotional distress in the fall of 2020. Qualitative analysis revealed that talk about mitigation strategies was frequent; most parents offered an explanation for pandemic changes, whereas fewer parents reported communicating support. Guided by the family stress model, we then examined whether different conversation types moderated the association between parent stress and child emotional distress. Only talk about pandemic changes and explanations that COVID-19 was dangerous acted as moderators, suggesting that these conversation types strengthened the association between parent stress and child emotional distress. A main effect of self-protective explanations being associated with lower child emotional distress was also found. We discuss the implications of these findings for future research on parent-child conversations about stressful situations. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).
Findings the Hub has extracted
Each claim below is labelled by its type of design and links back to this report.
- Intervention
- Parent conversations with young children about the COVID-19 pandemic, including talk about mitigation strategies, explanations of pandemic changes and danger, and communication of emotional support
- Population
- 205 parents of children aged 3-6 years (50.7% girls, 56.6% White) in the United States
Key finding
Talk about mitigation strategies was frequent; most parents explained pandemic changes but fewer communicated support