Academic Publications

An Interactive Training Model to Promote Cultural Humility For Early Childhood Professionals 

Professionals who work with young children need to understand the impacts of racism on development. The authors developed two models to address this need. One training model was held over the course of 6 months and contained three sessions. The other training model was a brief training that occurred one time. Both training models helped professionals understand their own biases; however, the three-session training showed greater understanding of bias. The training sessions were interactive and gave participants resources to use in their setting. This article compares the results of the two training models.
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Gender Role Ideology in Mothers and Fathers:
Relation with Parent-Child Aggression Risk Longitudinally

The current study examined the potential positive role of gender ideologies on maternal and paternal PCA risk over time, considering both individual and partner effects on PCA risk. Read more.

Mapping Cardiac Physiology and Parenting Processes in Maltreating Mother–Child Dyads

Child maltreatment (CM) lies on an extreme end of the continuum of parenting-at-risk, and while CM has been linked with a variety of behavioral indicators of dysregulation in children, less is known about how physiological markers of regulatory capacity contribute to this association. The present study examined patterns of mother and child physiological regulation and their relations with observed differences in parenting processes during a structured interaction. Read more.

Multimethod Assessment of Children’s Distress During Noninvasive Outpatient Medical Procedures: Child and Parent Attitudes and Factors

The present study assessed behavioral distress during noninvasive outpatient procedures in children ages 4–10 years using a multimethod approach. Factors hypothesized to exacerbate children’s distress included parents’ and children’s attitudes toward healthcare, children’s knowledge of medical settings, and parental anxiety. Read more.

Nonacademic Media

Child Sexual Abuse: What You Should Know

What families can do to foster an environment that encourages communication and understanding of safe and unsafe behaviors. Read more.

How to Help Your Children Heal from the Trauma of Addiction

If you grew up in a household that had significant stressors, which include things such as the history of substance use and parental substance use, your likelihood of growing up to experience health outcomes is significantly increased. These health outcomes could be anything from STDs to obesity to heart disease, cancer, chronic lung disease, liver disease. We found a direct link between these adverse childhood experiences and these later adult outcomes. Read more.

How COVID-19 Pandemic Has Affected the Mental Health of Teens

More than a third (36 percent) of students said they experienced racism before or during the COVID-19 pandemic. The highest levels were reported among Asian students (64 percent) and Black students and students of multiple races (both 55 percent). Read more.

Supporting a Gender Diverse Child

There is so much we intentionally and unintentionally do as parents to promote and support this process of gender identity development. Still, aside from parents, children themselves draw their own understanding of gender identity through a process called gender exploration. Read more.

4 Steps to adding Joy in Your Life

Whether it comes from sharing an inside joke with your closest friends, or doing an activity you love, joy is a state of being most of us could use more of, especially right now. Joy—and the positive emotions that come with it—can improve your mental health, lower stress, and help you feel calm. Read more.

During the Pandemic More Teens Experienced Symtoms of Depression

According to the findings, the pandemic contributed to a 6 percent increase in the number of adolescents with depressive symptoms, including low mood, poor concentration, and loss of pleasure. Read more.

The Body Neutrality Movement Wants You to Care Less About How You Look

“Body neutrality” is a movement to help individuals focus on accepting their bodies as they are. It is an attempt to move away from placing judgement on our appearances, both positive and negative, and not centring our bodies in discussions of self-worth and identity.  Read more.

How Do You Motivate Kids to Keep Their Room Clean

Both kids and adults can agree that cleaning is a tedious task. But cleaning and keeping a clean room offers many benefits aside from just having a tidy space.  Read more.

6 Science-Backed Reasons Why Trans Youth Need Gender-Affirming Care

Research says that gender-diverse kiddos know their gender identity just as well as gender non-diverse/gender-conforming kiddos.  Read more.

Are avoidant relationships the reasons your romantic life keeps hitting a dead end?

Our attachment styles are usually developed during childhood through a “combination of our temperament and the environments that we are raised in.” These styles then impact our own interpersonal relationships well into adulthood and then how we parent our own children.  Read more.