Psychological Health from Financial Hardships on Single Parents
Brittney Marks
March 22, 2021
Have you ever been a circumstance of not having the finances to support yourself or those you love? How did this make you feel? Do or did you feel like a failure or potentially an inconvenience to those love. Did the hinderance of not having financial support or mobility impact your mental health? Did you notice that your mental health got worse the more and more you subconsciously thought about your lack of financial mobility? The difficulty in trying to maintain responsibilities with lack of finances becomes a burden that many single parents encounter. Many parents develop psychological health issues because of Financial hardships. Psychological health creates dysfunction within the families’ relationships. Financial hardships make it difficult for single parents to gain the support that is needed to care for their self and their family. Throughout this paper I hope to prove that the lack of financial mobility has a negative impact on ones or family’s mental health. I hope throughout my research that I can prove or support the idea that mental health is impacted on the demand of being able to support yourself and those around you.
Having the responsibility to take care of those you love and yourself is a matter that is already overwhelming for an individual. Let’s imagine having to take care of yourself, your kids and their needs with little to no financial mobility. It becomes difficult to manage life responsibilities with the pressure of limited funds. In the article, “Interventions to reduce the impact of unemployment and economic hardship on mental health in the general population: a systematic review”, the authors reiterated that “Job loss, debt and financial difficulties are associated with an increased risk of mental illness, self-harm and suicide (Fitch et al.2011; Haw et al. 2015)”. They authors used multiple search engines and screened titles and abstracts and eligibility of full text reports. Cochrane Risk-of-Bias tool to investigate bias. Throughout their search they found that thousands of records supported their theory. They found studies that examined the effect of ‘job-club’ type interventions for unemployed people.
“A post-hoc subgroup analysis showed that the participants with higher risk of developing depression, based on the 25% of participants with highest baseline risk of depression, economic hardship and social assertiveness (Price et al. 1992) benefited most from the intervention (interaction: p = 0.01). In high-risk participants depression scores were reduced at 6 weeks [difference in means: −0.26, 95% confidence interval (CI) −0.48 to −0.04; interaction: F = 6.07 p = 0.01], 4 months (difference in means: −0.36, 95% CI −0.59 to −0.13; interaction: F = 12.14 p = 0.001) and 28 months (difference in means: −0.25, 95% CI −0.50 to 0.0; interaction: F = 6.05 p = 0.01) by up to almost 0.5 s.d. on the depression subscale of the Hopkins Symptom Checklist 90 (HSCL-90; see Table 2). JOBS I had no effect on employment at the same time points (see Table 3) (Caplan et al. 1989; Price et al. 1992; Vinokur et al. 1991a , b , 1995a; Vanryn & Vinokur, 1992).”
Meredith and Stack also proved in their article, Financial hardship on single Parents that sleepless, frustration, and distress were common. One of their participants in the study described her feeling exhausted and “she felt and collapsing once the children had gone to bed. All of her energy had been devoted to caring for her children, and once they were asleep, she would spend the time alone in a state of distress which involved exhaustion, crying, feeling overwhelmed, and sleeplessness.”
Most single parents struggle with support medically and socially and tend to feel absent and alone from there surroundings. Single mothers suffer the most out of the single parents. In the article, Promoting Strengths and Resilience in single Mothers, Taylor and conger recognize how “Overall, single mothers tend to be more socially isolated than married mothers, work longer hours, receive less emotional and tangible support, and have less stable social networks (Harknett & Hartnett, 2011). Single mothers with lower perceived social support have higher levels of internalizing symptoms and poorer parenting behaviors (Kotchick, Dorsey, & Heller, 2005; Lee et al., 2009; Murry et al., 2001). However, internalizing symptoms decrease as social support increases (Turner & Brown, 2010), and social support can moderate the relation between stressors and depression (Kotchick et al., 2005; Lee et al., 2009). Single mothers with higher levels of perceived social support are also more involved and confident as parents, and have better relationships with their children (e.g., Lee et al., 2009).” They used three types of interventions and participants were low-income Caucasian and African American single mothers with younger children.
“A few researchers have specifically assessed the effects of social support and peer education groups in single‐mother populations. Lipman et al. (2007) found that low‐income single mothers with young children who participated in a 10‐week program of group sessions offering social support and education had significantly improved mood and self‐esteem at 3 months postintervention compared to the control group who received a standard list of community resources. However, differences in adjustment for participants and the control group were nonsignificant at the 20‐month follow‐up. Similarly, participants (majority low‐income African American and Caucasian single mothers with young children) who participated in a 13‐week parenting and self‐care group program (Mom Power) and attended more than 70% of the group sessions showed medium effects of reduced levels of depression, posttraumatic stress, and feelings of helplessness, particularly for those with the highest mental health risk (Muzik et al., 2015). Also important, the majority of participants stated that they had made social connections with other group participants.”
Single parents are forced to work certain jobs that makes it hard to coincide with the support needed to care for their children. Greene explains that “Like non-standard hours, many of the jobs that require on-call scheduling are the very low-wage jobs that poor single mothers tend to occupy.” I agree with her statement because the jobs that are convenient for mothers are hard to get because of some of the companies don’t want to have to deal with the complications of families. Greene used data from the 2012 National Survey of Early Care and Education, she searched different surveys about low income working parents and scholarly writings bout the work and economic mobility. Even used qualitative study of low-income working mothers to support her arguments.
The stress from the financial hardship doesn’t only impact the parent but the whole family. Unintentional negative behavior is exemplified and breaks down the relationships within spouses and children. In the article, Clifford Stevenson, Sebastiano Costa, Juliet R.H. Wakefield, Blerina Kellezi, Rebecca J. Stack discussed “The depression and anxiety caused by economic pressure then impacts upon children within families. Spousal conflict can directly spill-over to negative interactions with children, but negative parental mood also predicts more coercive parenting, more hostile interactions, and less consistent discipline, all of which in turn are associated with negative developmental outcomes for children (Masarik & Conger, 2017). Children can also be affected by their awareness of family economic hardship, which serves to undermine their sense of self-efficacy and control, leading to greater emotional distress (Conger, Rueter, & Elder, 1999). “
As one can see, in the evidence and research provided throughout these articles we as readers and researchers can see that there is a correlation between the impacts of financial hardships on single parents more specifically single mothers. I hope we as readers a future leader in this world that we can initiate programs that focus on the aspect of financial poverty and how it ultimately contributes to mental health problems. This topic sparked my interest due to my passion of becoming a social worker. In my future career I want to be able to properly assist those who are struggling in poverty and possibly struggle with mental health issues. What can we as social workers do to assist with this issue? How can we prevent this issue? Programs that focus on financial stability of single parents and also focus on mental health issues such as the signs and treatments could help those overcome this struggle. Financial education programs that focus on saving and investing could also benefit. Overall, this research has opened my eyes to the problems that we still face in our world in respect to financial hardships and mental health. Research like this can give us the idea on what we can do better and how we can move forward to face these issues in our future careers.
References
Clifford Stevenson, Sebastiano Costa, Juliet R.H. Wakefield, Blerina Kellezi, Rebecca J. Stack,
Family identification facilitates coping with financial stress: A social identity approach to family financial resilience,
Journal of Economic Psychology,
Volume 78,
2020,
102271,
ISSN 0167-4870,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joep.2020.102271.
Dziak, E., Janzen, B.L. & Muhajarine, N. Inequalities in the psychological well-being of employed, single and partnered mothers: the role of psychosocial work quality and work-family conflict. Int J Equity Health 9, 6 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1186/1475-9276-9-6
Taylor, Z.E. and Conger, R.D. (2017), Promoting Strengths and Resilience in Single‐Mother Families. Child Dev, 88: 350-358. https://doi-org.umiss.idm.oclc.org/10.1111/cdev.12741
SARA STERNBERG GREENE * (2019 – 2020). ARTICLE: Working to Fail. Duke Journal of Gender Law & Policy, 27, 167. https://advance-lexis-com.umiss.idm.oclc.org/api/document?collection=analytical-materials&id=urn:contentItem:5YDM-G9J1-JGHR-M4T9-00000-00&context=1516831.
Moore, T. H. M., Kapur, N., Hawton, K., Richards, A., Metcalfe, C., & Gunnell, D. (2017). Interventions to reduce the impact of unemployment and economic hardship on mental health in the general population: A systematic review.Psychological Medicine, 47(6), 1062-1084. doi: http://dx.doi.org.umiss.idm.oclc.org/10.1017/S0033291716002944
SARA STERNBERG GREENE * (2019 – 2020). ARTICLE: Working to Fail. Duke Journal of Gender Law & Policy, 27, 167. https://advance-lexis-com.umiss.idm.oclc.org/api/document?collection=analytical-materials&id=urn:contentItem:5YDM-G9J1-JGHR-M4T9-00000-00&context=1516831. ARTICLE: Working to Fail, 27 Duke J. Gender L. & Pol’y 167, 170
Are you busy and do not have time to handle your assignment? Are you scared that your paper will not make the grade? Do you have responsibilities that may hinder you from turning in your assignment on time? Are you tired and can barely handle your assignment? Are your grades inconsistent?
Whichever your reason is, it is valid! You can get professional academic help from our service at affordable rates. We have a team of professional academic writers who can handle all your assignments.
Students barely have time to read. We got you! Have your literature essay or book review written without having the hassle of reading the book. You can get your literature paper custom-written for you by our literature specialists.
Do you struggle with finance? No need to torture yourself if finance is not your cup of tea. You can order your finance paper from our academic writing service and get 100% original work from competent finance experts.
Computer science is a tough subject. Fortunately, our computer science experts are up to the match. No need to stress and have sleepless nights. Our academic writers will tackle all your computer science assignments and deliver them on time. Let us handle all your python, java, ruby, JavaScript, php , C+ assignments!
While psychology may be an interesting subject, you may lack sufficient time to handle your assignments. Don’t despair; by using our academic writing service, you can be assured of perfect grades. Moreover, your grades will be consistent.
Engineering is quite a demanding subject. Students face a lot of pressure and barely have enough time to do what they love to do. Our academic writing service got you covered! Our engineering specialists follow the paper instructions and ensure timely delivery of the paper.
In the nursing course, you may have difficulties with literature reviews, annotated bibliographies, critical essays, and other assignments. Our nursing assignment writers will offer you professional nursing paper help at low prices.
Truth be told, sociology papers can be quite exhausting. Our academic writing service relieves you of fatigue, pressure, and stress. You can relax and have peace of mind as our academic writers handle your sociology assignment.
We take pride in having some of the best business writers in the industry. Our business writers have a lot of experience in the field. They are reliable, and you can be assured of a high-grade paper. They are able to handle business papers of any subject, length, deadline, and difficulty!
We boast of having some of the most experienced statistics experts in the industry. Our statistics experts have diverse skills, expertise, and knowledge to handle any kind of assignment. They have access to all kinds of software to get your assignment done.
Writing a law essay may prove to be an insurmountable obstacle, especially when you need to know the peculiarities of the legislative framework. Take advantage of our top-notch law specialists and get superb grades and 100% satisfaction.
We have highlighted some of the most popular subjects we handle above. Those are just a tip of the iceberg. We deal in all academic disciplines since our writers are as diverse. They have been drawn from across all disciplines, and orders are assigned to those writers believed to be the best in the field. In a nutshell, there is no task we cannot handle; all you need to do is place your order with us. As long as your instructions are clear, just trust we shall deliver irrespective of the discipline.
Our essay writers are graduates with bachelor's, masters, Ph.D., and doctorate degrees in various subjects. The minimum requirement to be an essay writer with our essay writing service is to have a college degree. All our academic writers have a minimum of two years of academic writing. We have a stringent recruitment process to ensure that we get only the most competent essay writers in the industry. We also ensure that the writers are handsomely compensated for their value. The majority of our writers are native English speakers. As such, the fluency of language and grammar is impeccable.
There is a very low likelihood that you won’t like the paper.
Not at all. All papers are written from scratch. There is no way your tutor or instructor will realize that you did not write the paper yourself. In fact, we recommend using our assignment help services for consistent results.
We check all papers for plagiarism before we submit them. We use powerful plagiarism checking software such as SafeAssign, LopesWrite, and Turnitin. We also upload the plagiarism report so that you can review it. We understand that plagiarism is academic suicide. We would not take the risk of submitting plagiarized work and jeopardize your academic journey. Furthermore, we do not sell or use prewritten papers, and each paper is written from scratch.
You determine when you get the paper by setting the deadline when placing the order. All papers are delivered within the deadline. We are well aware that we operate in a time-sensitive industry. As such, we have laid out strategies to ensure that the client receives the paper on time and they never miss the deadline. We understand that papers that are submitted late have some points deducted. We do not want you to miss any points due to late submission. We work on beating deadlines by huge margins in order to ensure that you have ample time to review the paper before you submit it.
We have a privacy and confidentiality policy that guides our work. We NEVER share any customer information with third parties. Noone will ever know that you used our assignment help services. It’s only between you and us. We are bound by our policies to protect the customer’s identity and information. All your information, such as your names, phone number, email, order information, and so on, are protected. We have robust security systems that ensure that your data is protected. Hacking our systems is close to impossible, and it has never happened.
You fill all the paper instructions in the order form. Make sure you include all the helpful materials so that our academic writers can deliver the perfect paper. It will also help to eliminate unnecessary revisions.
Proceed to pay for the paper so that it can be assigned to one of our expert academic writers. The paper subject is matched with the writer’s area of specialization.
You communicate with the writer and know about the progress of the paper. The client can ask the writer for drafts of the paper. The client can upload extra material and include additional instructions from the lecturer. Receive a paper.
The paper is sent to your email and uploaded to your personal account. You also get a plagiarism report attached to your paper.
GET A PERFECT SCORE!!! 
Delivering a high-quality product at a reasonable price is not enough anymore.
That’s why we have developed 5 beneficial guarantees that will make your experience with our service enjoyable, easy, and safe.
You have to be 100% sure of the quality of your product to give a money-back guarantee. This describes us perfectly. Make sure that this guarantee is totally transparent.
Read moreEach paper is composed from scratch, according to your instructions. It is then checked by our plagiarism-detection software. There is no gap where plagiarism could squeeze in.
Read moreThanks to our free revisions, there is no way for you to be unsatisfied. We will work on your paper until you are completely happy with the result.
Read moreYour email is safe, as we store it according to international data protection rules. Your bank details are secure, as we use only reliable payment systems.
Read moreBy sending us your money, you buy the service we provide. Check out our terms and conditions if you prefer business talks to be laid out in official language.
Read more