Psychosocial mechanisms for the transmission of somatic symptoms from parents to children

Table 1 Characteristics of the sample

Characteristics	Case	Control
Children, n	296	335
Age, yr (mean ± SD)	11.89 ± 2.62	11.84 ± 2.49
Male sex, %	48.6	49
Ethnicity, %
Caucasian	77.5	82.6
African American	5.8	5.7
Asian	6.1	8.7
Hispanic	4.8	2.4
Native American	0.7	0.3

Table 2 Number of medical clinic visit for each symptom category by mothers and children in case and control families, and correlation between number of mother and child visits

Symptom category	Case families			Control families			Combined samples
	Mother	Child	rho	Mother	Child	rho	All mothers	All children	rho
	mean ± SE	mean ± SE		mean ± SE	mean ± SE		mean ± SE	mean ± SE
Gastrointestinal	3.27 ± 0.18c	0.61 ± 0.16a	0.064	0.20 ± 0.03	0.20 ± 0.05	0.042	1.62 ± 0.11	0.39 ± 0.08	0.219e
Upper respiratory infection	2.07 ± 0.14c	1.97 ± 0.15c	0.290e	0.74 ± 0.06	1.08 ± 0.09	0.326e	1.37 ± 0.08	1.50 ± 0.09	0.355e
Asthma	0.60 ± 0.13c	0.48 ± 0.10	0.203e	0.09 ± 0.02	0.30 ± 0.08	0.180e	0.32 ± 0.06	0.37 ± 0.06	0.204e
Headache	1.47 ± 0.42b	0.25 ± 0.06	0.056	0.22 ± 0.06	0.14 ± 0.04	0.097	0.76 ± 0.20	0.19 ± 0.03	0.089d
Back pain	1.43 ± 0.23c	0.17 ± 0.04	0.168d	0.31 ± 0.05	0.12 ± 0.03	-0.038	0.77 ± 0.09	0.14 ± 0.02	0.080d
All outpatient visits	30.25 ± 1.53c	12.90 ± 0.80c	0.348e	10.74 ± 0.43	8.45 ± 0.49	0.260e	19.80 ± 0.083	10.50 ± 0.46	0.375e

^aP < 0.05 case vs control;

^bP < 0.01 case vs control;

^cP < 0.001 case vs control;

^dP < 0.05 mother vs child;

^eP < 0.001 mother vs child.

Table 3 Psychological traits in children and their mothers

Psychological trait	Case families			Control families			Combined samples
	Mother	Child	rho	Mother	Child	rho	All mothers	All children	rho
	mean ± SE	mean ± SE		mean ± SE	mean ± SE		mean ± SE	mean ± SE
Global psychological distress	2.81 ± 0.10a	55.16 ± 0.62a	0.414b	1.22 ± 0.07	48.46 ± 0.53	0.376b	1.99 ± 0.07	51.65 ± 0.42	0.484b
Anxiety	0.66 ± 0.04a	4.64 ± 0.25a	0.314b	0.30 ± 0.02	2.65 ± 0.17	0.354b	0.46 ± 0.02	3.60 ± 0.15	0.393b
Depression	1.01 ± 0.04a	2.20 ± 0.15a	0.282b	0.48 ± 0.03	1.29 ± 0.09	0.301b	0.77 ± 0.03	1.72 ± 0.09	0.345b
Somatization	1.15 ± 0.04a	3.24 ± 0.16a	0.366b	0.45 ± 0.02	1.73 ± 0.10	0.157b	0.78 ± 0.03	2.43 ± 0.10	0.374b

^aP < 0.001 case vs control;

^bP < 0.001 mother vs child.