Protective parenting practices among mothers living with HIV and their adolescent children: a qualitative study

ABSTRACT

Growing up with a mother living with HIV (MLH) is a unique experience for adolescents. Children in these families often thrive; however, many also exhibit behavioral health problems including HIV risk behaviors. Under a lens of youth risk reduction, we examined the role of protective parenting practices in their lives including parent-child communication about sex, parent-child relationship quality, parental monitoring, and mother-to-child HIV disclosure. For this exploratory study, we conducted four focus groups with MLH (n = 15) and 13 in-depth interviews with HIV-negative adolescent children of MLH. Participants were primarily African American and recruited from clinics and non-profit organizations in the southeastern United States. A thematic analysis of focus group and in-depth interview data revealed that mothers’ prior experiences with HIV and HIV-related risks often underlie their strengths as parents – for example, confidence in their ability to discuss sexual risk topics with their children as well as enhanced motivation to monitor their children’s whereabouts and exposure to risky environments. Nonetheless, many MLH face challenges, including problems with mother-to-child HIV disclosure and relationship disruptions, which likely hinder protective parenting. Implications of our findings include specific recommendations for adapting effective and culturally-informed prevention interventions for families affected by maternal HIV infection.

KEYWORDS:

• HIV
• mothers
• prevention
• adolescent
• parent-child relationship

Acknowledgements

We would like to acknowledge the HIV and Families Research Lab at Georgia State University for their help on this project (Jennifer Williams, Karie Gaska, Jamee Carroll, Nada Goodrum, and Becky LeCroix), as well as Drs. Gabriel Kuperminc, Nadine Kaslow, and Erin Tully, who served on the first author’s dissertation committee and provided feedback on the study. We also thank the mothers and adolescents who participated for their time and willingness to share their experiences with us.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute of Mental Health of the National Institutes of Health under award numbers F31MH098805 (PI: Tarantino), K23MH114632 (PI: Tarantino), K24HD062645 (PI: Guthrie), and T32MH078788 (PI: Brown). Qualitative analysis guidance was provided by the Qualitative Science and Methods Training Program (DPHB, Alpert Medical School of Brown University). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.