Positive parenting moderates associations between childhood stress and corticolimbic structure

Childhood stress has a deleterious impact on youth behavior and brain development. Resilience factors such as positive parenting (e.g. expressions of warmth and support) may buffer youth against the negative impacts of stress. We sought to determine whether positive parenting buffers against the negative impact of childhood stress on youth behavior and brain structure and to investigate differences between youth-reported parenting and caregiver-reported parenting. Cross-sectional behavioral and neuroimaging data were analyzed from 482 youth (39% female and 61% male, ages 10–17) who participated in an ongoing research initiative, the Healthy Brain Network (HBN). Regression models found that youth-reported positive parenting buffered against the association between childhood stress and youth behavioral problems (β = −0.10, P = 0.04) such that increased childhood stress was associated with increased youth behavior problems only for youth who did not experience high levels of positive parenting. We also found that youth-reported positive parenting buffered against the association between childhood stress and decreased hippocampal volumes (β = 0.07, P = 0.02) such that youth who experienced high levels of childhood stress and who reported increased levels of positive parenting did not exhibit smaller hippocampal volumes. Our work identifies positive parenting as a resilience factor buffering youth against the deleterious impact of stressful childhood experiences on problem behaviors and brain development. These findings underscore the importance of centering youth perspectives of stress and parenting practices to better understand neurobiology, mechanisms of resilience, and psychological well-being.