Gourisankar Amritha, Ravi Preethi, Kalokhe Ameeta, Waford Hall Rachel, Vaidya Nilakshi, Sharma Eesha, Holla Bharath, Basu Debasish, Bharath Rose Dawn, Chakrabarti Amit, Desrivieres Sylvane, Hickman Matthew, Kartik Kamakshi, Ghattu Krishnaveni, Kalyanaraman Kumaran, Krishna Murali, Kuriyan Rebecca, Murthy Pratima, Papadopoulos Orfanos Dimitri, Purushottam Meera, Kurpad Sunita Simon, Lenin Singh Rajkumar, Lourembam Singh Roshan, Nanjayya Subodh Bhagyalakshmi, Toledano Mireille B, Benegal Vivek, Schumann Gunter, Kalyanram Kartik
Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, United States of America.
Emory Rollins School of Public Health, Atlanta, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2025 May 28;20(5):e0304936. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0304936. eCollection 2025.
Domestic violence (DV) is experienced by one in three women in India and is linked to poor mental health outcomes. We hypothesize that maternal experiences of DV can have negative impacts on the mental health of their children. Previous studies have demonstrated this link in Western countries, however culturally specific manifestations of DV and mental health disorders and socio-cultural differences in parent-child relationships and home environments necessitate deeper understanding of the impacts of maternal experiences of DV on children in the Indian context.
This study presents a secondary analysis of data collected from a seven-center study in urban and rural India examining mental health disorders among adolescents aged 12-17 years and psychological, physical, and sexual abuse affecting their mothers. The Indian Family Violence and Control Scale (IFVCS) was used to examine experiences of DV among mothers and the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview-Kid (MINI-Kid) was used to examine mental health outcomes among adolescents. Multivariate analyses examined the associations between maternal DV and adolescent mental disorders.
Data from 2,784 adolescent-mother pairs were analyzed. In bivariate analyses, maternal experiences of physical, psychological, and sexual abuse were significantly associated with adolescent common mental disorders including anxiety and depression (p < 0.05). After adjusting for adolescent gender, site, and education status in the multivariate analysis, physical, sexual, and any DV were significantly associated with adolescent anxiety disorders and common mental disorders. Physical abuse was significantly associated with adolescent depressive disorders.
These results suggest that exposure to maternal DV significantly impacts adolescent mental health in India and underscore the need to develop trauma-informed school programs and enhance DV prevention for women in India.
在印度，三分之一的女性遭受过家庭暴力（DV），这与不良的心理健康结果相关。我们假设母亲遭受家庭暴力的经历会对其子女的心理健康产生负面影响。先前的研究已在西方国家证实了这种联系，然而，家庭暴力和心理健康障碍在文化上的具体表现，以及亲子关系和家庭环境中的社会文化差异，使得有必要更深入地了解在印度背景下母亲遭受家庭暴力的经历对子女的影响。
本研究对从印度城乡七中心研究中收集的数据进行了二次分析，该研究调查了12至17岁青少年的心理健康障碍以及影响他们母亲的心理、身体和性虐待情况。使用印度家庭暴力与控制量表（IFVCS）来调查母亲遭受家庭暴力的经历，使用儿童版迷你国际神经精神病学访谈（MINI-Kid）来调查青少年的心理健康结果。多变量分析研究了母亲遭受家庭暴力与青少年精神障碍之间的关联。
对2784对青少年-母亲的数据进行了分析。在双变量分析中，母亲遭受身体、心理和性虐待的经历与青少年常见精神障碍（包括焦虑和抑郁）显著相关（p < 0.05）。在多变量分析中，在对青少年性别、地点和教育状况进行调整后，身体、性和任何形式的家庭暴力与青少年焦虑症和常见精神障碍显著相关。身体虐待与青少年抑郁症显著相关。
这些结果表明，在印度，接触到母亲遭受家庭暴力的情况会对青少年心理健康产生重大影响，并强调有必要制定注重创伤的学校项目，加强对印度女性的家庭暴力预防工作。
