(PS3-11) Family Accommodation Moderates Parental Distress and Child Anxiety

Abstract Text: Research indicates that parents who experience high levels of distress are likely to have children with elevated anxiety symptoms. However, little is known about the conditions under which this relationship occurs. Family accommodation is a common response among parents of children with anxiety. While parents intend to provide relief to their children and themselves, family accommodation inadvertently reinforces child anxiety by perpetuating anxiety-related avoidance behaviors, which can maintain or even exacerbate both the child’s anxiety and parent’s distress over time. This study examines whether family accommodation moderates the association between parental distress and child anxiety. We hypothesized that parental distress would be positively associated with child anxiety at high levels of family accommodation but not low levels of family accommodation.
Participants were 93 youth (ages 6-17 years, M = 10.10 years, SD = 3.02; 89.8% White, 89.7% Hispanic or Latino; 56.3% females assigned at birth) referred to an anxiety disorders specialty research clinic. Using parent-reported questionnaires, we measured child anxiety symptoms using the Screen for Child Anxiety Related Disorders (SCARED), parent distress symptoms using the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS), and family accommodation using the Family Accommodation Scale – Anxiety (FASA).
Parent distress was positively and significantly associated with child anxiety, r = .384, p < .001, and family accommodation, r = .296, p = .004. Family accommodation significantly moderated the association between parent distress symptoms and child anxiety symptoms, such that parental distress was positively associated with child anxiety symptoms when family accommodation scores were low, but not high.
Contrary to our hypothesis, findings suggest that high levels of family accommodation do not exacerbate the relationship between parental distress and child anxiety. Instead, family accommodation acts as a buffer, with parental distress no longer being associated with child anxiety at high levels of accommodation. These results expand on existing literature by highlighting the dual role of family accommodation in alleviating immediate distress for children and their parents and sustaining anxiety-related behaviors. Given that the association between parental distress and child anxiety was present at low levels of family accommodation, clinical interventions should focus on equipping parents with alternative supportive strategies that reduce distress without reinforcing anxiety-related behaviors.