Decades of research document powerful associations between parents’ characteristics and children’s marital behaviors. “Parental mental health strongly shapes or disrupts family life and long-term opportunities for children—although its influence has largely been ignored in the literature,” explains William G. Axinn, interim director of the Ford School’s International Policy Center.

In a new study, Axinn investigates the dynamics between the social organization of families and parental mental health using data from over 10,000 individuals in the Chitwan Valley, Nepal. Setting his research in Nepal— with its near universal marriage and childbearing practices and pronounced gendered household roles—offered a context to examine the effects of both mothers’ and fathers’ depression on the children.

Depression may affect a parent’s ability to work and may increase spousal conflict, which can lead to a child’s earlier departure from home. Specifically, Axinn focused on the timing of marriage, a factor with significant longterm economic, educational, and health implications.

Axinn’s findings suggest a father’s history of depression— regardless of onset—is associated with a son’s faster entry into marriage, but not a daughter’s. Axinn explains that in Nepal, many children do not independently choose their spouses. However, sons generally have more involvement and autonomy in spousal selection, making it more likely they opt for marriage as a means of leaving home.

Mothers’ depression is a predictor of their daughters’ marriage timing, but not sons’. The association between mothers’ depression and the timing of their daughters’ marriages is observed primarily when mothers experience postpartum depression during their daughters’ early years.

“There is no shortage of evidence that parents strongly influence their children worldwide, including in marriage timing. That means these powerful consequences of parental mental disorders are likely to affect children everywhere, and depression is the most common mental disorder worldwide,” says Axinn.

He concludes, “Young marriages often disrupt educational attainment, reducing employment opportunities, lifetime earnings, and access to health care. Moreover, treating parental mental disorders can reduce the consequences on their children.”

» Read “Parental depression and their children’s marriage timing: The long-term consequences of parental mental disorders” in Social Science & Medicine, April 2024.