Cultural context of caregiving: differences in depression between Puerto Rican and non-Latina White mothers of adults with mental retardation.

Differences in depression between Puerto Rican and non-Latina White mothers providing care to their adult child with mental retardation were examined. The focus of this study is on how family problems may mediate the effect of the adult's behavior problems on the mother's level of depressive symptoms and how this process differs across the two groups of mothers. As hypothesized, family problems was a stronger predictor of depressive symptoms for Puerto Rican mothers than for non-Latina White mothers. In addition, Puerto Rican mothers were in poorer physical health, which further accounted for differences in depression between the two groups.