Parents’ stress and distress in the face of their children’s self-injurious thoughts and behaviors: a scoping review

Children’s and youths’ self-injurious thoughts and behaviors (SITBs) significantly impact their parents, often causing elevated stress and distress. In addition to managing the emotional toll, parents need to actively participate in their child’s recovery, adding a second layer of caregiving burden. Despite the clinical relevance of this issue, few quantitative studies have examined parental stress during their child’s suicidal crisis, and the nature of this association remains insufficiently understood. To address this, we conducted a scoping review to identify, summarize, and synthesize quantitative studies linking children’s and youths’ SITBs with parental stress and/ or distress. We systematically searched three databases for research published on or before May 2023. Studies were eligible if they provided data on the association or impact of children’s and youths’ SITBs on parental stress and/ or distress levels, including intervention studies that reported outcomes related to parental distress. The findings of this review highlight three key insights: (1) Descriptive data suggest that parental stress and/ or distress is significant among parents of children and youths exhibiting SITBs, even when not reaching the clinical threshold for psychopathology; (2) Parents of children and youths with SITBs report significantly higher levels of stress and distress compared to parents in control groups; (3) Parents benefit from various therapeutic interventions. This scoping review underscores the importance of investigating the nature and magnitude of the association between children’s and youths’ SITBs and parental stress and distress, as well as the outcomes of targeted interventions.