Peer-reviewed article
Maternal mental health and its influence on children's early development: Evidence from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.
Hentschel E, Hasan A, Tahir-Chowdhry M, Tomlinson H, Ansari A et al. ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study examined how maternal mental health affects young children's development in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Researchers surveyed over 2,000 children aged 0-72 months and their mothers, measuring maternal depression, anxiety, and parenting stress. The findings show that maternal mental health problems are common in the region and significantly harm children's early development, even when accounting for poverty and limited access to education.
Key points
- Multiple maternal mental health concerns frequently co-occur among mothers in the study population
- Maternal depression, anxiety, and parenting stress have negative and compounding effects on child development for both younger (0-35 months) and older (36-72 months) children
- The negative associations between maternal mental health and child development remain significant even after controlling for poverty, limited education access, and reduced social assistance
- The study reveals substantial prevalence of mental health challenges among mothers in the region
- Policy recommendations emphasize the need for community-level mental health services and reduction of household and community stressors
Limitations
The study is cross-sectional and observational, so it cannot establish causation or clarify the mechanisms through which maternal mental health influences child development. The findings are specific to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and may not generalise to other regions of Pakistan or other countries with different contexts.
Abstract
Little is known about the prevalence of maternal mental health challenges in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan and the ways in which it may influence the development outcomes of young children. This study describes the prevalence of three measures of maternal mental health: depression, anxiety and parenting stress, and assesses whether they independently or jointly predict early child development (ECD) even after accounting for stressors such as poverty, low access to quality education and limited social assistance. A population-proportionate, cluster-randomized household survey was conducted collecting data from a total of 1397 children aged 0-35-months-old and 705 children aged 36-72-months-old and their mothers. Unadjusted and adjusted Ordinary Least Squares linear regression analyses were run for the independent and joint association of maternal depression, anxiety, and parenting stress on ECD. There is a substantial prevalence of mental health concerns among the mothers in our sample-with several mental health concerns co-occurring. Maternal depression, anxiety, and parenting stress have a significant, negative and compounding interaction on child development for younger and older children, even after controlling for stressors and other covariates. Policy improvements are needed that focus on at-risk communities, providing mental health services and reducing exposure to stressors within communities and households.
Findings the Hub has extracted
Each claim below is labelled by its type of design and links back to this report.
- Intervention
- Identification of maternal mental health (depression, anxiety, parenting stress) as a predictor of child development outcomes
- Population
- 1397 children aged 0-35 months and 705 children aged 36-72 months, and their mothers in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan
Key finding
Maternal mental health concerns are substantially prevalent in the study sample with multiple concerns frequently co-occurring
E et al. · Europe PMC · 1 Sept 2026