The Influence of Parental Migration on Left-behind Children’s Mental Health in China: the Mediating Roles of Daily Stress and Sense-Making

Yao Fu and Jia Chen ()
Additional contact information
Yao Fu: The University of Hong Kong
Jia Chen: Shanghai University

Applied Research in Quality of Life, 2022, vol. 17, issue 5, No 2, 2455-2477

Abstract: Abstract Despite growing attention to health impacts of parental migration on children left behind, little is known about the mechanism through which parental migration may affect children’s mental health. This study examined how various parental migration experiences — namely, migration history, paternal migration, maternal migration, or both parents’ migration — are associated with children’s mental health. Moreover, we adopted a stress-and-coping model to examine the mediating roles of daily stress and sense-making in the association between parental migration and children’s mental health. Using a multi-stage probability strategy, the sample included 1907 students with a mean age of 13.66 in Western China. Results showed that children with both parents having migrated had increased risk of being depressive, and children with a migrant father were less likely to have flourishing mental health compared with children whose parents had no migration history. Left-behind children’s vulnerability towards poor mental health could be explained by increased levels of daily stress. Sense-making could mediate the negative impacts of daily stress on mental health outcomes. Social services are required to promote left-behind children’s mental health, with a focus on reducing daily stress and enhancing children’s coping capabilities.

Keywords: Migration; Left-behind children; Daily stress; Sense-making; Mental health (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11482-021-09983-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:ariqol:v:17:y:2022:i:5:d:10.1007_s11482-021-09983-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/journal/11482

DOI: 10.1007/s11482-021-09983-x

Access Statistics for this article

Applied Research in Quality of Life is currently edited by Daniel Shek

More articles in Applied Research in Quality of Life from Springer, International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().