Editorial: ‘It's a family affair’ – the social drivers of child and adolescent resilience

Abstract

Studies of risk and vulnerability processes may provide important ways of identifying new treatment targets – based on the principle that mending something is much easier if you know in what way it is broken. However, in our field, knowing its source may not always tell us about how to remediate impairment. Studies focusing on resilience may be more informative from this perspective. In this editorial I discuss four papers that highlight the value of resilience studies from a translational perspective – in particular contrasting the strengths and limitations of observational and experimental designs.

One size does not fit all: Trajectories of body image development and their predictors in early adolescence

“…Though the number of early adolescents (28.2% of girls and 4.4% of boys in our study) who evidenced low levels of body esteem from age 11 years is concerning, the majority of the sample reported moderate (41.2% of girls and 49.2% of boys) or high (30.2% of girls and 45.2% of boys) body esteem, consistent with prior studies (Rodgers et al, 2016; Wang et al, 2019). In line with the shift toward focusing on resilience and protective factors in youth mental health (Sonuga-Barke, 2019), understanding more about this high body esteem subgroup may assist in the selection of therapeutic targets. In the current study, adolescents with higher self-esteem and lower dietary restraint were more likely to display the high body esteem trajectory.…”

“…In addition to helping identify individuals at highest risk and prevent negative outcomes, examining trajectories of body image development may increase understanding of individuals who exhibit healthier patterns. A recent shift in the field of child and adolescent mental health has emphasized the importance of focusing on resilience and protective factors (Sonuga-Barke, 2019) in addition to psychopathology. Studies examining body image development have largely focused on the development of body dis satisfaction, rather than the more global construct of body esteem.…”

Editorial: The primacy of parenting

“…The primacy of parenting has become increasingly understood with advances in developmental science (Sonuga‐Barke, 2019). Humans are altricial animals, and by definition are born in a fragile and underdeveloped state and require the support and nurturance of caregivers early in life in order to survive and to facilitate healthy development.…”

Editorial: Closing in on causal links between environmental exposures and human development using observational data – “confound those confounders!”

“…The Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry has featured many influential studies and reviews addressing this important topic. It has been at the heart of ensuing discussions about the strengths and limitations of different designs to bolster causal interpretations, what these have told us so far and what the mechanisms of action might be (Sonuga‐Barke, ). There has also been consideration of how these research findings might be used to improve prevention and/or treatment by changing environmental circumstance and experiences.…”