Association of Parental Workplace Injury with Emotional and Behavioral Problems of Children

Details

• Personal Author:
  Asfaw A
• Description:
  Problem statement: Most studies on the burden of occupational injuries and illnesses focus on worker and workplace-specific economic impacts such as cost of healthcare, loss of productivity, workers' compensation costs, and presenteeism. This study asks whether occupational injuries can reach beyond the worker and the workplace to affect family members of injured workers. We investigated whether children of parents with workplace injury were more likely to manifest emotional and behavioral problems than children of non-injured parents. To our knowledge, these associations have not been previously described. Methods: We used data from the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), a household interview survey. Each year of the survey, a sample child is randomly selected from each sampled household and an extensive array of detailed health, school, behavioral and other information is collected via a proxy/key informant (usually a parent). The questions we used to assess emotional or behavioral health were from the short version of the strengths and difficulties questionnaire and were only asked of respondents of sample children aged 4-17. Injury episode data were collected from the family respondent during the family core interview and establish whether one of the parents experienced an occupational injury. We linked the sample child file with the injury episode file. Five years of data (2012-2016) were combined yielding 433 children with an injured parent, and a comparison group of 41,574 children. ... This study opens a new research dimension by providing empirical evidence of an association between parental workplace injury and the psychological well-being of children. These findings are consistent with an emergent body of research showing that workplace psychological demands can crossover to adversely influence health-related outcomes in the families of workers, including their children (Bakker, Westman, and van Emmerik, 2009; Ohu et al., 2018; Stuart and Barling, 1996; Westman, 2015). Our injury-related effects would benefit from confirmatory study, and underlying mechanisms need to be investigated. Further, research is needed to better understand the magnitude of parental injury effects on children and their socioeconomic impact. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Behavior Family Men Mental Disorders Mental Health Nervous System Occupational Health Safety Surveys And Questionnaires Women
• Keywords:
  Behavioral Disorders Behavior Patterns Children Emotional Stress Families Health Surveys Injuries Mental Health Mental Processes National Health Interview Survey NHIS Psychological Effects Questionnaires Socioeconomics Worker Health

  More +
• Publisher:
  American Psychological Association
• Document Type:
  Text
• Genre:
  Abstract or Summary
• Place as Subject:
  District of Columbia ; OSHA Region 3 ; Pennsylvania
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  OD - Office of the Director
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  177-178
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20059097
• Citation:
  Work, Stress and Health 2019, November 6-9, 2019, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2019 Nov; :177-178
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2020
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Source Full Name:
  Work, Stress and Health 2019, November 6-9, 2019, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:21f183aa188a765273d9fc4fd2f90359913f869657f0a9408508bf3c8a753074f9b7bb02dd47a7898207f79c2ef5f9319070f6cc15f3589cb87ffcfa09ceefb9
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/223413/cdc_223413_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 123.36 KB ]