Insecure attachment to primary caregivers is associated with the development of depression symptoms in children and youth. This association has been shown by individual studies testing the relation between attachment and depression and by meta-analyses focusing on broad internalizing problems instead of depression or adult samples only. We therefore metaanalytically examined the associations between attachment security and depression in children and adolescents, using a multilevel approach. In total, 643 effect sizes were extracted from 123 independent samples. A significant moderate overall effect size was found (r = .31), indicating that insecure attachment to primary caregivers is associated with depression. Multivariate analysis of the significant moderators that impacted on the strength of the association between attachment security and depression showed that country of the study, study design, gender, the type of attachment, and the type of instrument to assess attachment uniquely contributed to the explanation of variance. This study suggests that insecure attachment may be a predictor of the development of depression in children and adolescents. When treating depression in children, attachment should therefore be addressed.

Many electronic platform packages are intended for self-study and marketed as complete learning solutions; however, little is known about how well they work or under what conditions they should be used. This article reports on a study conducted at the Taxandria cvo Turnhout that explores the way adult learners use Smartschool – in Belgium a popular, commercially available, technology-mediated electronic learning environment. The Taxandria cvo Turnhout uses this electronic platform for more than five years in blended language learning classes for professional French. The participating adults from different Belgium companies agreed to use this program according to manufacturer’s usage guidelines and to complete regular assessments to document their language proficiency throughout their sixty hours courses. The most striking finding was a significant participant attrition towards the evaluation process, which was likely due to a variety of technological difficulties as well as the lack of sufficient support for autonomous learning in the workplace. This lack of compliance with self-study suggests that despite the logistical ease of providing an electronic platform as Smartschool for blended language learning, more resource-intensive types of language training are more likely to be effective

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