2011 The Palm Beach County Family Study (Full Report)

Health, Healthcare, and ChildDevelopmentMothers’ Health and HealthcareWhen asked about the state of their health in year 5, a large majority (83%) of the mothers described it infavorable terms as “good,” “very good,” or “excellent.” This percentage is similar to the percentage ofmothers who described their health in these terms the previous year (see Table 11). Consistent with thefindings of the previous 4 years, the percentage of mothers who reported physical or mental healthproblems that kept them from working or attending school, or limited the kind of work they could do, wassmall (between 5 and 7% in each year).Mental Health and FunctioningWe again used two instruments to assess maternal functioning in the fifth year: the 20-item Center forEpidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D; Radloff, 1977) and the Parenting Stress Index ShortForm (PSI/SF; Abidin, 1995). Scores on the CES-D can range from 0 to 60, with higher scores indicatingthe presence of more depressive symptoms. CES-D scores for the sample in year 5 ranged from 0 to 43,with an average of 9.7 (see Table 11). Twenty-one percent of the mothers had scores of 16 or higher,suggesting some level of depression. This percentage was fairly stable between years 2 and 4, andrepresents a significant decrease compared to year 1. Five percent of the mothers had scores of 30 orhigher, indicating the possibility of severe depression. Compared with other mothers in the sample, thesemothers were more likely to be single and not currently in a relationship. They also had slightly lowerlevels of education and demonstrated somewhat higher levels of parenting stress on the PSI/SF than didthe rest of the sample.Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago 23