Background and objective Surgery in a paediatric setting stresses children and their parents. Previous studies have focused on children and the preoperative period; however, the 24 h after child surgery are highly stressful for parents as their child is still physically recovering and physician–parent communication is vital. The aims of this study are to investigate the impact of three levels of severity of paediatric surgery on mothers’ and fathers’ anxiety and stress and to identify factors that contribute to parental anxiety and acute stress symptoms in the first 24 h after child surgery. Patients and methods A total of 154 parents (91 mothers, 63 fathers) of children who had just undergone elective surgery for a major intervention (n = 41), minor intervention (n = 64) or day surgery (n = 49) completed questionnaires aimed at assessing levels of state anxiety and acute stress symptoms. Social network, socio-economic status and parental health locus of control were evaluated as contributors. Results Parents reported high levels of state anxiety (26% had scores on the state scale 2 standard deviations above the norm) and acute stress symptoms (28% in at least one of the four acute stress disorder symptom categories). Child’s type of surgery is related to parental anxiety [F(2,134) = 38.12, P = 0.0001, η2 = 0.175] and acute stress symptoms [F(2,133) = 31.21, P = 0.0001, η2 = 0.133]. Parental state anxiety was predicted by parent’s gender, trait anxiety and health external locus of control. Parent’s number of acute stress symptoms was predicted by parental trait anxiety, health external locus of control, parent’s level of education and the number of social contacts. Conclusions There is a need to take into consideration parental anxiety and distress in the 24 h after child surgery. Parental well-being is related to several characteristics including the severity of child surgery; these aspects should be taken into consideration when interacting with parents in the aftermath of their child’s surgery.

More research is needed on the causal factors influencing child's ability to cope with pain, and in particular more attention should be devoted to the contextual and family factors related to pediatric headache.

On account of a series of unique historical events, the present-day denizens of South Tyrol inhabit a cultural, political, and linguistic autonomous region that intercalates Italians and Austrian/German Italians. We compared contemporary Italian and Austrian/German Italian girls' and boys' adaptive behaviors in everyday activities in this region. Using the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales, we first interviewed mothers about their children's communication, daily living, socialization, and motor skills. Main effects of local culture (and no interactions with gender) emerged: Austrian/German Italian children were rated higher than Italian children in both adaptive daily living and socialization skills. Next, we explored ethnic differences in childrearing. Austrian/German Italians reported fostering greater autonomy in their children than Italians, and children's autonomy was associated with their adaptive behavior. Children living in neighboring Italian and Austrian/German Italian cultural niches appear to experience subtle but consequentially different conditions of development that express themselves in terms of differing levels of adaptive behaviors.

This study explores parental ethnotheories of children's temperament through mothers' responses to McDevitt and Carey's Behavioral Style Questionnaire (1978) for 299 children aged 3 to 8 years and interviews with their parents, in Australia, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden, and the United States. We first established a standardized, “derived etic” version of the questionnaire with adequate reliability for 8 of the original 9 scales. Cross-cultural comparisons of the scales' means showed generally similar perceptions of children's behavior. However, intercorrelations of the mean ratings with each other and with global “difficulty,” as presented through multidimensional scaling, showed both general tendencies and culture-specific patterns, which are further illustrated by parental discourse about “difficult” children in each sample. The findings underline the importance of parental ethnotheories for shaping the expression of temperament in development.

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