Child care providers experience high levels of anxiety and depression
Since March 2021, the RAPID Survey Project has been surveying child care providers to learn about their emotional well-being. RAPID saw a trend in parents of declining well-being during the pandemic and investigated this trend among providers.
Download the complete fact sheet for direct quotes from survey participants and more.
Child care providers are integral to the functioning of our society. The work of educating and caring for young children is challenging and requires providers to not only implement activities and manage child personal care routines, but also to support the overall development of young children. Providers do all this under challenging working conditions, including low pay and ever-changing requirements.
In this fact sheet, we report on data from March 2021 through July 2023 and focus on what we are hearing about providers’ emotional well-being, specifically symptoms of anxiety and depression. According to the World Health Organization, anxiety and depression can cause significant distress and interfere with daily activities.
We aimed to understand anxiety as a collection of symptoms that include feeling nervous or restless/fidgety, and depression as a collection of symptoms that include feeling sad, hopeless, worthless, or like everything is an effort.
Symptoms of anxiety and depression are prevalent among child care providers
About 50% of the child care providers experienced moderate-to-high levels of anxiety symptoms, including feeling nervous or restless/fidgety.
Depression symptoms were also prevalent among providers: 50% of providers experienced moderate-to-high levels of feeling like everything was an effort. About a third of providers reported moderate-to-high levels of sad, hopeless, or worthless feelings.
Altogether, half of the providers RAPID surveyed experienced symptoms of anxiety or depression.
Child care providers’ reported anxiety and depression symptoms, overall
Moderate-to-high levels included participants who responded to having these symptoms “Some of the time” or “Most/all of the time.”
Child care providers' reports of anxiety and depression remain higher than pre-pandemic levels
We asked providers to reflect on their emotional well-being. Providers were much more likely to perceive increased levels of anxiety and depression symptoms compared to their perceived pre-pandemic experiences.
Child care providers who experience anxiety and depression are more likely to also experience material hardship
In previous RAPID fact sheets, we’ve found that when providers experience material hardship, they also report higher levels of emotional distress (a composite of anxiety, depression, loneliness, and stress).
This fact sheet builds on those findings through an innovative approach to data analysis called Structural Topic Modeling (STM). Every RAPID survey invites participants to answer open-ended questions, to expand on their experiences in their own words. STM allows us to identify the most commonly occurring topics in the open-ended text responses.
The STM data show that providers who experience anxiety and depression are also likely to raise topics related to difficulty meeting basic family needs. One of the most common topics in open-ended question responses was related to material hardship, with participants saying they were not always able to pay for basic needs.
This association between material hardship and emotional well-being is particularly concerning because of the high levels of hardship among child care providers.
As of August 2023, 44% of providers surveyed reported experiencing difficulty affording at least one area of basic need.
Concluding thoughts
Child care providers play a key role in the lives of children and families, and in our economy and communities. The data show that many providers are experiencing high levels of anxiety and depression and difficulty meeting their basic needs at the same time.
More can be done to support the emotional and economic well-being of the important people caring for our youngest children. Systemic changes, including providing a living wage and improving working conditions, are within our collective social power and responsibility.
Download the complete fact sheet for direct quotes from survey participants and more.