Latent change modeling of Latino parent–child conflict and pathways to mental health

Objective: This secondary analysis of longitudinal data on Latino immigrant parents applied latent change modeling to investigate the association between within-family change in parent–child conflict and within-individual change in parent's psychological distress, and how within-individual change in parenting stress mediates that association over time. Background: Immigrant parents face additional challenges when parenting their children. There is limited research regarding how parent–child conflict may influence parenting stress and parents' overall well-being, in particular in Latino immigrant families. Method: Secondary analysis was conducted on data from a sample of 344 Latino immigrant parents who participated in a community-based parenting skills invention. In the original intervention study, they were assigned randomly to intervention or waitlist control groups and assessed at three points: baseline, 4 months (post-intervention), and a follow-up 10 months after the baseline assessment. Results: Across 4 months, change in parent–child conflict was significantly associated with changes in parenting stress and psychological distress, whereas across 10 months, change in parent–child conflict was only associated with change in psychological distress. The indirect effects through parenting stress were non-significant. However, participating in the intervention had a protective indirect effect by reducing parenting stress across 4 months and reducing psychological distress across 10 months via change in parent–child conflict. Conclusion: Changes in parent–child relations were related to changes in parents' individual well-being, with those associations varying across different time periods.