School of Psychology and Early Start, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia.
School of Psychology, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand.
PLoS One. 2021 Dec 16;16(12):e0260891. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0260891. eCollection 2021.
Parent mental health and wellbeing may have implications for understanding attachment transmission. In this systematic review, we synthesise the published literature to determine the nature of the relationship between parent mental health and wellbeing and the intergenerational transmission of attachment and to provide recommendations for future research, clinical practice and intervention.
Using the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) approach, five electronic databases were searched for peer-reviewed empirical studies, published in English. Articles were considered for inclusion if data was collected on adult attachment, child attachment, and a domain of parent mental health/wellbeing. No date parameters were applied to the search strategy. The review was registered with PROPSERO (registration number: CRD42020157247).
Eleven studies examining the impact on parent mental health and wellbeing on the intergenerational transmission of attachment were identified for inclusion in this review. Our review found preliminary evidence that parent mental health and wellbeing play a role in the intergenerational transmission of attachment. Other key findings from the review were: evidence quality is mixed due to variable measurement of attachment and mental health; studies have mostly included correlational analysis or do not utilise contemporary methodological approaches to testing mediating or moderating relationships; and literature is largely focused on psychopathology and negative factors of mental health.
The limited scope of parent mental health and wellbeing constructs examined in the literature, the sparse use of robust statistical analyses, and the lack of literature in general makes it difficult to draw conclusions on how and why parent mental health impacts attachment transmission. Addressing these limitations will further progress attachment-related literature and may have particular implications for attachment-informed interventions with clinical populations.
父母的心理健康和幸福感可能对理解依恋传递有影响。在这项系统评价中，我们综合了已发表的文献，以确定父母的心理健康和幸福感与代际传递之间的依恋关系的性质，并为未来的研究、临床实践和干预提供建议。
使用系统评价和荟萃分析的首选报告项目（PRISMA）方法，在五个电子数据库中搜索同行评议的实证研究，以英文发表。如果数据是关于成人依恋、儿童依恋和父母心理健康/幸福感的某个领域收集的，则考虑纳入文章。搜索策略没有应用日期参数。该综述在 PROPSERO（注册号：CRD42020157247）上进行了注册。
确定了 11 项研究，这些研究检查了父母的心理健康和幸福感对依恋代际传递的影响，纳入了本次综述。我们的综述发现了初步证据，表明父母的心理健康和幸福感在依恋的代际传递中发挥作用。综述的其他主要发现包括：由于依恋和心理健康的测量变量不同，证据质量参差不齐；大多数研究采用相关分析，或者不利用当代方法来测试中介或调节关系；文献主要集中在精神病理学和心理健康的负面因素上。
文献中检查的父母心理健康和幸福感的范围有限，很少使用稳健的统计分析，以及文献总体上的缺乏，使得难以得出关于父母心理健康如何以及为何影响依恋传递的结论。解决这些局限性将进一步推进与依恋相关的文献，并且可能对具有临床意义的依恋知情干预具有特殊意义。
