Should an adolescent receive individual or family therapy? It may depend on the level of their parents’ psychological distress

Does A Parent’s Mental Health Affect How Well An Adolescent Responds To Psychological Interventions?

Parents play an important role in their adolescents’ lives. When parents are suffering from their own mental health issues, their children suffer as well. For example, when parents experience psychiatric symptoms, their adolescent children are more likely to use substances or develop mood disorders. However, there is little research involving how parents’ mental health issues affect how well adolescents respond to psychological interventions, especially for interventions that target adolescents’ use of substances such as marijuana and alcohol, and their sexual risk behaviors such as engaging in unprotected sex. There is even less research of this type on adolescents involved in the juvenile justice system. Thus, the current study set out to fill these gaps in the literature.