Stress and Parenting during the Coronavirus Pandemic

Parents are spending more time than ever before with their child since the Coronavirus crisis. On the positive side, most parents say they feel close to their child. Yet, many parents are more stressed out than ever before. For a large number of parents, financial concerns, other worries, social isolation, loneliness and sadness are getting in the way of parenting. Experts may be right to worry about whether the increased economic insecurity and parenting stress will result in an uptick in child abuse rates. For example, parents reported a high level of psychological and physical punishment of children.  Furthermore, rates of shouting, yelling and screaming at children were very high, with 4 out of 10 parents saying they had done this a few times or more in the past 2 weeks. Given that these data were collected relatively early in the Coronavirus pandemic lockdown, these rates are expected to increase over time as economic conditions worsen and parents’ stress levels increase. Advocates for children should be concerned about whether these behaviors will continue and impact children.