The role of maltreatment risk in the interplay between maternal and child’s empathy over time

Parental empathy is associated with risk of child maltreatment which is, in turn, associated with children’s negative social outcomes. Yet familial relationships are not unidirectional. We aimed to examine the interplay between maternal and child empathy over two time points, two years apart, and how these are moderated by abuse risk. Participants were N = 250 mothers of children aged 4–10 years (48.4% girls). Bivariate change score models were computed to examine the relationship between changes in maternal and child’s empathy. Maternal empathic concern predicted an increase in her child’s cognitive empathy two years later. Interestingly, the child’s cognitive empathy predicted a decrease in maternal personal-distress two years later, but only for high abuse-risk mothers. Additionally, maternal empathic concern predicted an increase in child’s cognitive empathy for high abuse-risk mothers. The current study highlights the dynamic relationship between maternal empathy, maltreatment risk, and child’s empathy.