Grandparent caregivers report poorer psychological and physical health, but relationship status has been shown to influence burden. The current study investigated depressive symptoms of 3288 grandparents who completed the third wave of the National Survey of Families and Households. The study found that those who are unmarried were more likely to be grandparent caregivers, and female participants reported higher depressive symptoms. Marital status and caregiving status were comparable predictors of depression, but marital status did not buffer the effects of caregiving status on depression. Caregiving status accounted for a significant amount of depressive symptom variance for depression, comparable to marital status and gender. There was a significant difference in depressive symptoms of married and unmarried grandparent non-caregivers but with a significantly lower baseline depression rate than grandparent caregivers. Future research should examine whether making social support options available to unmarried grandparent caregivers who lack informal support from a spouse may improve outcomes.

中文翻译：

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照料对祖父母样本中婚姻状况与心理健康关系的影响。

祖父母照料者报告心理和身体健康状况较差，但已证明关系状况会影响负担。目前的研究调查了 3288 名完成第三波全国家庭和家庭调查的祖父母的抑郁症状。研究发现，未婚者更有可能是祖父母的照料者，女性参与者报告的抑郁症状更高。婚姻状况和照料状况是抑郁症的可比预测因素，但婚姻状况并不能缓冲照料状况对抑郁症的影响。与婚姻状况和性别相当，照料状况导致抑郁症的抑郁症状差异很大。已婚和未婚祖父母非照料者的抑郁症状存在显着差异，但基线抑郁率显着低于祖父母照料者。未来的研究应该检查为缺乏配偶非正式支持的未婚祖父母照顾者提供社会支持选项是否可以改善结果。