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Original research
Parental employment quality and the mental health and school performance of children and youth
  1. Anne E Fuller1,2,
  2. Faraz V Shahidi3,4,
  3. Jinette Comeau5,
  4. Li Wang6,7,
  5. Gita Wahi1,
  6. James R Dunn7,
  7. Harriet MacMillan2,6,
  8. Catherine S Birken8,
  9. Arjumand Siddiqi4,
  10. Katholiki Georgiades2,6
  1. 1Department of Pediatrics, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
  2. 2Offord Centre for Child Studies, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
  3. 3Institute for Work and Health, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
  4. 4Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
  5. 5Department of Sociology, King’s University College at Western University, London, Ontario, Canada
  6. 6Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
  7. 7Department of Health, Aging & Society, McMaster University Faculty of Social Sciences, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
  8. 8Department of Paediatrics, The Hospital for Sick Children, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
  1. Correspondence to Dr Anne E Fuller; fulleae{at}mcmaster.ca

Abstract

Background Lower-quality employment, characterised by excessive or part-time hours, irregular schedules and inadequate earnings, is a key social determinant of health among adults. Research examining parental employment quality in relation to the mental health and school performance of children is lacking. The study objective was to measure the associations between parental employment quality and child mental health symptoms and school performance.

Methods We conducted a secondary analysis of the cross-sectional 2014 Ontario Child Health Study. Dependent variables were parent-reported child mental health symptoms and school performance. We used latent class analysis (LCA) to characterise employment status, hours, scheduling and earnings of parents. We used linear and multinomial regression to model the associations between parental employment quality, mental health symptoms, and school performance.

Results Our study sample consisted of 9,927 children. The LCA of dual-parent households yielded three classes of parental employment quality, which we labelled ‘Dual Parent, High Quality’, ‘Dual Parent, Primary Earner Model’ and ‘Dual Parent, Precarious’. The LCA of single-parent households yielded two further classes, which we labelled ‘Single Parent, High Quality’ and ‘Single Parent, Precarious’. Compared with children in the ‘Dual Parent, High Quality’ group, children in all other groups had higher-level mental health symptoms and lower school performance. Children with ‘precarious’ parental employment in both groups showed the least favourable outcomes.

Conclusions Lower-quality parental employment was associated with increased mental health symptoms and poorer school performance among children. A clearer understanding of these relationships and their underlying mechanisms can help inform relevant policies and interventions.

  • MENTAL HEALTH
  • Health inequalities
  • CHILD HEALTH

Data availability statement

Data may be obtained from a third party and are not publicly available. Data are stored and managed by Statistics Canada and are accessible through Statistics Canada Research Data Centres.

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

https://doi.org/10.1136/jech-2024-223366

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    Data availability statement

    Data may be obtained from a third party and are not publicly available. Data are stored and managed by Statistics Canada and are accessible through Statistics Canada Research Data Centres.

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    Footnotes

    • AEF and FVS are joint first authors.

    • AEF and FVS contributed equally.

    • Contributors AEF conceptualised and designed the study, reviewed the analyses, drafted the initial manuscript and critically reviewed and revised the manuscript. FVS conceptualised and designed the study, reviewed the analyses and critically reviewed and revised the manuscript. JC, GW and AS conceptualised and designed the study and critically reviewed and revised the manuscript. LW conceptualised and designed the study, conducted the analyses and critically reviewed and revised the manuscript. JRD, HMcM and CB critically reviewed and revised the manuscript. KG conceptualised and designed the study, designed the data collection instruments, reviewed the analyses and critically reviewed and revised the manuscript. All authors approved the final manuscript as submitted and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work. AEF is the guarantor.

    • Funding This research was supported by a Catalyst Grant from the Edwin S.H. Leong Centre for Healthy Children. Grant number: not applicable.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Supplemental material This content has been supplied by the author(s). It has not been vetted by BMJ Publishing Group Limited (BMJ) and may not have been peer-reviewed. Any opinions or recommendations discussed are solely those of the author(s) and are not endorsed by BMJ. BMJ disclaims all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on the content. Where the content includes any translated material, BMJ does not warrant the accuracy and reliability of the translations (including but not limited to local regulations, clinical guidelines, terminology, drug names and drug dosages), and is not responsible for any error and/or omissions arising from translation and adaptation or otherwise.