Purpose: Parenting has implications for psychosocial adjustment well into adulthood. While much is known about the parenting behaviors that influence adjustment in autistic children, little is known about how the effects of parenting persist in autistic adults. Further, autistic adults' perspectives on how they were parented have not been…

Recent studies showed that attachment security can change within persons, suggesting that there might be an interplay between a rather stable (trait) and rather variable (state) part of attachment. The study's first aim was to investigate whether attachment priming could influence the level of state attachment. The second aim was to explore…

The underlying mechanisms between family income and mental health of children merit further investigation. Based on the family stress model and the psychological factors model, we proposed that familial factors (parental depression and parenting) and the individual factor (child self-esteem) would mediate the relationship between family income and…

Children and young adults who are 'looked after' can present teachers and teaching assistants with a variety of day-to-day classroom challenges and a range of complex behaviours due to adverse childhood environments. This group of vulnerable young people have very complex social and emotional behaviours that require a considered approach of…

Background: It is widely accepted that family caregivers are central to the future of cancer care and the impetus is to understand how best to support and empower them. Aims: This study explored the role of the relationship between the caregiver and the child, the level of perceived support, and the self-compassion of the caregiver, on distress…

Background: Children and adolescents with high callous-unemotional traits (CU) are more likely to engage in aggressive and antisocial behaviours, such as cyber-bullying, but the relationship is not direct, as it may be influenced by other factors. Objective: In the absence of substantial supporting evidence, the purpose of this study was to…

Purpose: Divorce has negative effects on children, although emotions that children experience after parental divorce are open to different interpretations. Accordingly, this study was conducted to explore loneliness in children of divorce. Design/methodology/approach: A constructivist grounded theory study was carried out through the lens of…

Some children form an attachment to a variety of inanimate objects, such as cloths or soft toys, referred to as attachment objects. This study examined the developmental change in children's behaviours toward their attachment objects to understand the role of such objects through an online survey of 700 parents with 0- to 9-year-old children, of…

Children who are currently, or were previously, 'looked after' by the state, are educationally disadvantaged, with exclusion rates historically higher than in other groups in the UK. A conventional way of thinking about these children is that they have been affected by trauma and attachment issues in their early years, and that they import their…

Background: A digital micro-intervention offering attachment psychoeducational videos was explored regarding its feasibility in parents of children with severe disabilities. Method: A mixed-methods study (including daily diaries and one-time questionnaires) with 16 parents (75.0% female) of children with severe disabilities (up to 10 years of age)…

We examined the prototype v. revisionist models of attachment stability with a five-wave, 6-year, longitudinal study of attachment security from middle childhood to adolescence in a White Western European sample (N = 157; Wave 1 M[subscript age] = 10.91, SD = 0.87; 52% female). Attachment was assessed using both questionnaire (Experiences in Close…

A growing body of literature shows that adherence to some aspects of Western masculinity norms, including the suppression of emotional vulnerability, avoidance of seeking support from others, and exaggerated physical toughness, is associated with poorer psychological and social outcomes. While existing research suggests that parental gender…

Over the past 25 years Forest School in the UK has been growing in popularity as part of a wider resurgence of interest in outdoor learning. A key driver behind this recurrence of interest has been a growing concern over the lack of child exposure to outdoor experiences and with the natural world and their ensuing nature-deficit disorder. This…

The relevance of the quality of parent-child interactions for child development has long been established. Nevertheless, research on beliefs about maternal sensitivity is still scarce, to an even greater extent in the context of child disability. This inquiry aimed to describe beliefs about sensitive parenting among mothers of children with…

In terms of data, young people who have been adopted are an invisible population in Northern Ireland schools. With increasing knowledge of the impact of being an adoptee and adverse childhood experiences, and greater understanding of the importance of attachment, more research into the school experience of adopted young people is necessary. This…