Longitudinal Pathways of Paternal Depression: Risk, Resilience, and Health in Diverse Fathers

家庭受益于父亲的参与。然而，转变为父亲可能是男性患抑郁症风险增加的时期，这对家庭有重要影响。例如，父亲的抑郁与孩子的行为和健康问题、母亲的抑郁、较差的关系质量和较差的整体家庭幸福有关。解释父亲抑郁与家庭结果之间关系的具体机制仍未得到充分研究，特别是在不同父亲的人群中，他们的父亲经历可能在重要方面有所不同。本研究建立在发展和家庭心理学的理论见解基础上，以理解父亲抑郁和家庭结果之间关系的基础机制。这些见解将为针对父亲和家庭的实践和政策努力提供信息，还将培训学生，并为来自代表性不足群体的个人提供早期职业指导。调查结果将广泛传播给学术和非学术受众，包括通过有针对性的公共宣传。该项目将跟踪现有的父亲样本，这些父亲是在他们第一个孩子出生之前招募的，在他们初为人父的头七年里，主要有三个目标：1)描述父亲抑郁症状的纵向轨迹；2)检验父亲抑郁症状、家庭功能和儿童发育之间的关系；3)研究父亲抑郁症状与心理神经免疫学结果之间的关系。该研究通过全面的方法来实现这些目标，包括收集用于评估免疫功能的生物学数据、脑成像和行为观察。作为第一个对父亲围产期抑郁症及其与儿童和母亲健康以及免疫和大脑健康之间关系的前瞻性、纵向研究之一，该项目将为父亲心理健康、父子关系和儿童发展提供新的见解。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Families benefit from father involvement. Yet, the transition to fatherhood can be a time of heightened risk for depression in men, with important consequences for families. For example, paternal depression has been linked with behavior and health problems in children, greater maternal depression, poorer relationship quality, and poorer overall familial well-being.The specific mechanisms that explain the relationship between paternal depression and family outcomes remain under-studied, especially in populations of diverse fathers whose experiences of fatherhood may differ in important ways. This study builds on theoretical insights from developmental and family psychology to understand the mechanisms underpinning relationships between paternal depression and family outcomes. Insights will inform practice and policy efforts geared toward fathers and families, and will also train students and provide early-career mentoring for individuals from underrepresented groups. Findings will be disseminated broadly to academic and non-academic audiences, including via targeted public outreach. The project will follow an existing sample of fathers recruited before the birth of their first child across the first seven years of new parenthood, pursuing three primary objectives: 1) describe the longitudinal trajectories of paternal depressive symptoms; 2) test relationships among paternal depressive symptoms, family functioning, and child development; and 3) examine associations between paternal depressive symptoms and psychneuroimmunological outcomes. The study pursues these objectives via holistic methodological approach, including collection of biological data for assessment of immunological function, brain imaging, and behavioral observations. As one of the first prospective, longitudinal studies of paternal perinatal depression and its associations with child and mother well-being as well as immune and brain health, this project will yield new insights into father mental health, father-child relationships, and child development.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.