ArticleBMC public health2021
Impact of parent-child separation on children's social-emotional development: a cross-sectional study of left-behind children in poor rural areas of China.
Article in BMC public health, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers.
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Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed.
- Mental Health of Early and Prolonged Parent-Child Separated Children in Chinese Immigrant Families: A Qualitative Study With Parent-Child Dyads.Child & family social work · 2026Article
- Family ecological influences on early childhood development in Shanghai, China: a cross-sectional study.BMC pediatrics · 2026Article
- Adaptive Reunification for Children and Parents Affected by Early and Prolonged Parent-Child Separation: Insights from Separated-Reunited Parent-Child Dyads.Youth & society · 2026Article
- Challenging situations experienced by mothers in seasonal agricultural migration and their coping strategies: a qualitative study.BMC women's health · 2026Article
- "A chance to open my heart": Protective factors for mental health in left-behind family members of Nepalese labor migrants and their implications for future psychosocial interventions.PLOS global public health · 2026Article
- Cyberbullying and cybervictimization patterns among left-behind and non-left-behind adolescents in China: a latent profile analysis.BMC psychology · 2025Article
- A longitudinal examination of loneliness in left-behind children: the interaction between self-esteem and academic self-efficacy matters.BMC psychology · 2025Article
- Early parent-child separation and adolescent depressive symptoms: the mediating role of self-perceived pleasure in social interactions.BMC psychology · 2025Article
- The impact of parental migration on left-behind children's tooth health in China.BMC public health · 2025Article
- How teachers' social-emotional competence affects bullying in rural schools: the chain mediating effect of students' social-emotional competence and classmate relationship.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Migrant parent-child separation in the first three years of life and mental health problems at preschool age: A cross-sectional study.Journal of migration and health · 2025Article
- Psychological wellbeing and social emotional competence of Chinese children and adolescents in the post-pandemic era: patterns, determinants, and interrelations.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Associations between left-behind children's characteristics and psychological symptoms: a cross-sectional study from China.BMC psychiatry · 2024Article
- Association of early parent-child separation with depression, social and academic performance in adolescence and early adulthood: a prospective cohort study.Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health · 2024Article
- Social-emotional problems in 3-to 5-year-old children: a cross-sectional study of highly educated migrants in a Chinese urban area.Frontiers in public health · 2024Article
- Multigenerational birth cohort study in China: importance, necessity and beyond.World journal of pediatrics : WJP · 2023Article
- The Development of Emotion Understanding among Five- and Six-Year-Old Left-Behind Children in Rural China.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Article
- The impact of parental migration on left-behind children's vision health in rural China.BMC public health · 2023Article
- Previous School Bullying-Associated Depression in Chinese College Students: The Mediation of Personality.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Article
- Effects of Parental Migration on Dental Caries of Six- to Eight-Year-Old Children Using Structural Equation Modeling.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
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12 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundParent-child separation is a considerable adversity for left-behind children (LBC), but there is little evidence on the association between detailed characteristics of parent-child separation and social-emotional development among LBC. This study examined the characteristics of parent-child separation and its impacts on developmental delay among under-3 LBC in poor rural China.
methodsWe used data from 811 LBC surveyed in five poor counties in rural China in 2018. Detailed characteristics of their parental migration were recalled by their primary caregivers in face-to-face interviews. The children's social-emotional development was measured by using the Ages and Stages Questionnaire: Social-Emotional. Logistic regression was employed to examine the association of detailed characteristics of parent-child separation with early social-emotional problems after adjusting for the children's and primary caregivers' sociodemographic characteristics.
results287 (35.4%) children were left behind by fathers and cared for by mothers (FM-MC), while 524 (64.6%) were left behind by both parents and cared for by grandparents (PM-GC). The rate of social-emotional problems among LBC was 36.8% (PM-GC vs FM-MC: 40.6% vs 29.5%; aOR 1.51, 95% CI: 1.06 to 2.16). For paternal migration, the medians of the child's age at the first migration and average duration per migration were 3 months (IQR: 1 to 9 months) and 4.48 months (IQR: 2.38 to 7.54 months), respectively. For maternal migration, the corresponding values were 9 months (IQR: 6 to 13 months) and 4.65 months (IQR: 2.71 to 7.62 months), respectively. On average, LBC had been separated from fathers for 72% of their life due to paternal migration and from mothers for 52% of their life due to maternal migration. No significant association was found between the detailed characteristics of paternal migration and social-emotional development among LBC, while social-emotional problems among LBC were significantly associated with the proportion of cumulative duration of maternal migration in the child's lifetime (aOR 2.83; 95% CI: 1.13 to 7.10).
conclusionsLBC under 3 years had a high risk of social-emotional problems in poor rural China. Cumulative exposure to maternal migration may be detrimental to LBC's early social-emotional development. Programs are necessary to support these children as well as their families.
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