Department of Sociology, King's University College at Western University, London, ON, Canada.
Children's Health Research Institute, Division of Children's Health and Therapeutics, Lawson Health Research Institute, Western University, London, ON, Canada.
Can J Public Health. 2020 Aug;111(4):585-593. doi: 10.17269/s41997-020-00299-1. Epub 2020 Mar 2.
To examine the link between stability and change in social assistance (SA) use and children's mental health trajectories to better understand whether social policies targeted at low-income families might be an effective population-based mechanism for preventing mental health problems among children at risk.
The National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (N = 8981) is used to classify children into 5 categories based on their family's pattern of SA use from age 4-5 to 10-11: always or never on SA, a single transition on or off SA, or fluctuations on and off SA. Latent growth modelling is used to compare trajectories of emotional and behavioural problems among children with different patterns of SA exposure to their counterparts never on SA over this same time period.
Child emotional and behavioural problems are exacerbated over time in accordance with patterns of SA use: chronic SA use (behavioural) and moving onto SA (emotional and behavioural). These differential rates of change result in mental health disparities at age 10-11 that were not present at age 4-5. Children exposed to SA when they were age 4-5 but subsequently moved off continue to demonstrate elevated levels of emotional and behavioural problems at age 10-11.
Successful social policies and interventions will require understanding the specific mechanisms through which SA undermines child mental health and how programs can be modified to reduce its negative consequences.
研究社会援助（SA）使用的稳定性和变化与儿童心理健康轨迹之间的联系，以更好地理解针对低收入家庭的社会政策是否可能是预防高危儿童心理健康问题的有效基于人群的机制。
使用全国儿童纵向调查（N=8981），根据儿童 4-5 岁至 10-11 岁期间家庭的 SA 使用模式将儿童分为 5 类：始终或从不使用 SA、单次使用或停用 SA、或 SA 波动。潜增长模型用于比较在同一时期内，具有不同 SA 暴露模式的儿童与从未使用过 SA 的儿童的情绪和行为问题轨迹。
儿童的情绪和行为问题随着 SA 使用模式的变化而加剧：慢性 SA 使用（行为）和转为使用 SA（情绪和行为）。这些不同的变化率导致了 10-11 岁时的心理健康差异，而在 4-5 岁时则没有。在 4-5 岁时接触过 SA 但随后停用的儿童在 10-11 岁时仍表现出较高的情绪和行为问题水平。
成功的社会政策和干预措施需要理解 SA 破坏儿童心理健康的具体机制，以及如何修改计划以减少其负面影响。
