Between the ages of three and five, children with a parent deployed to a war zone tend to exhibit more behavior problems than their peers without deployed parents, according to a report released on November 3, 2008 in Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
More than two million children in the U.S. have had a parent deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan in the course of the wars, according to the article. Of these children, 40% are younger than five years old. According to the authors, research into the psychological effects on these children has been long overdue, and has been called for by several important agencies. “Recent policy statements from the American Psychological Association and the Department of Defense Task Force on Mental Health have called for research on the effect of wartime deployments on children in military families,” they write.
To delve into the psychological effects of parental deployment on children, Molinda M. Chartrand, M.D., of the Boston University School of Medicine and Boston Medical Center, and colleagues examined 169 families with children between the ages of one and a half and five who were enrolled in childcare centers at a Marine base in 2007. Assesment was performed by questionnaire completed by parents and childcare providers. The survey analyzed behavior problem assessment for internalizing behaviors, such as anxiousness, depression, and withdrawal, and externalizing behaviors, such as attention problems and aggression. It also included questions to evaluate parents’ levels of depression, rank and deployment status of any parents in the service, family composition, and parents’ ages, educations, and ethnicities.
In the 169 responding families, 33% (55) had at least one deployed parent, and the average deployment length of this parent was 3.9 months. Children with a deployed parent who were older than three had significantly higher externalizing behavior scores and overall behavior problem scores than children of the same age without a deployed parent. The authors commented on these differences, which remained even after controlling for several additional factors. “Such reported differences might be dismissed as distorted perceptions of the child by the distressed non-deployed parent; however, the association remained after controlling for parental stress and depressive symptoms,” they write. The childcare providers had similar trends in scores.
The authors point out that further research is needed in this area, including studies that continue over time. “Larger, longitudinal studies are needed to ascertain whether there are changes in children’s behavior from the time before parental deployment, during parental deployment and at the time of reunification,” they write. They continue that this research must also be expanded to children of different branches of the armed services. “This information is necessary to provide clinicians serving military families with evidence-based anticipatory guidance and clinical interventions. Finally, the needs of the children of deployed parents in the National Guard and Reserves also warrant urgent further elucidation.”
In an accompanying editorial, David J. Schonfeld, M.D., and Robin Gurwitch, Ph.D., of the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center commented on the importance of considering children in the policies made and services provided for families of deployed armed service members. “The decision to send troops into war is never taken lightly, and the sacrifices experienced by the soldiers, their families and their country are heavy burdens that may be considered intrinsic to war itself,” they write. “However, our country’s policies must be based on efforts to take all reasonable steps to minimize known negative effects; thus, these research results, which are unlikely to be surprising to pediatricians and other child health care providers, are nonetheless timely and important.”
They continue, advocating for more attention to the families of deployed troops. “Findings from this study highlight the need for increased attention to the mental health concerns of young children of deployed soldiers as well as the mental health concerns of the soldiers and non-deployed spouses,” they write. “They raise questions of how to best determine deployment length and what preventive measures can be taken to reduce stress and distress to the non-deployed spouses and children left behind.”
Effect of Parents’ Wartime Deployment on the Behavior of Young Children in Military Families
Molinda M. Chartrand; Deborah A. Frank; Laura F. White; Timothy R. Shope
Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2008;162(11):1009-1014.
Effect of Parents’ Deployment on Young Children: Findings That Are Long Overdue
David J. Schonfeld; Robin Gurwitch
Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2008;162(11):1094-1095.
Written by Anna Sophia McKenney