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Updated: Jan 6, 2026
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Assessing the Coherence of Parents' Short Narratives Regarding their Child Using the Five-Minute Speech Sample Procedure
Published on: September 19, 2019
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Associations between Parental Depression and Anxiety and Children's Internalizing and Externalizing Problems:
Ellie Mae Dorrans1,2, Amy Paine3,4, Christopher Hobson5,6
1School of Psychology, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK. dorransem@cardiff.ac.uk.
Child Psychiatry and Human Development
|September 24, 2025
Summary
Parental expressed emotion (EE) strongly predicts child internalizing and externalizing problems. High EE in parents is linked to more severe child emotional and behavioral issues, informing early intervention strategies.
Area of Science:
- Child Psychology
- Developmental Psychology
- Clinical Psychology
Background:
- Parental psychopathology impacts child emotional and behavioral development via home emotional climate.
- Expressed Emotion (EE) measures parental attributions about a child and is a transdiagnostic risk factor.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the association between parental psychopathology, Expressed Emotion (EE), and child internalizing/externalizing problems.
- To determine if EE is a stronger predictor of child problems than parental mental health symptoms.
Main Methods:
- Included 247 children (aged 4-7) referred for psychosocial issues and their caregivers.
- Assessed parental psychopathology using the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) and Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL).
- Measured EE using the Five-Minute Speech Sample (FMSS) and Expressed Emotion Coding System.
Main Results:
- EE, parental anxiety/depression symptoms, and child internalizing/externalizing problems were positively correlated.
- EE was more strongly associated with the severity of child internalizing and externalizing problems than parental mental health symptoms.
- EE explained more variance in child internalizing problems than parental anxiety and predicted externalizing problems alongside socioeconomic deprivation and parental anxiety.
Conclusions:
- Findings support attributional models of EE and its transdiagnostic role in child emotional and behavioral problems.
- EE is a significant predictor of internalizing and externalizing problems in young children.
- Results can inform interventions for emerging childhood mental health issues.
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