Impact of parental mental illness on the child

In this Swedish study, researchers evaluated the relationship between parental mental illness (non-affective and affective psychosis, substance abuse, depression, anxiety and stress, eating disorders, personality disorders, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, autism, and intellectual disability) and the risk of child placement. Children living with parents affected by a mental illness were four times more likely to be placed in foster care than children whose parents had no mental illness. The risk was particularly high when the mental illness affected the mother and was associated with an intellectual disability. The risk was also higher during the child’s first year of life and among socially disadvantaged families.