Parents of children with emotional disorders: Issues for consideration and practice

Abstract

Parents with children who have serious emotional disorders face significant personal and family issues in their parental role. Professionals providing services to these families must be sensitive to a variety of issues if they are to provide an emphathic context when these families are seeking help. This paper will explore the stress these families incur, the loss they experience, and the resources needed for coping and the preservation of family integrity. Practice implications will be addressed.

School-Linked Services Integration

“…Most of the large-sample, longitudinal databases that are available on services integration systems at present are coming out of two state-level services integration initiatives: the Kentucky Education Reform Act (see Cannon, Kalafat, & Illback, 1994;Illback, 1993;Illback & Kalafat, 1995); and California's Healthy Start Initiative (see Wagner et al, 1994). One of the more encouraging findings that has been documented repeatedly is that parents are willing and able to be participating partners in the service integration process (Friesen & Koroloff, 1990;Hanson & Rapp, 1992;Modrcin & Robison, 1991). Four of these are reviewed in substantive detail in Kagan et al, 1995: Colorado (Family Centers Program); Florida (Full Service Schools); Indiana (Step Ahead Program); and Oregon (Oregon Benchmarks Program).…”

How parents view professional behaviors: A cross-professional analysis

“…Overall, this literature documents barriers to full participation of families, describes differences between parents' and professionals' values and perspectives, and contains suggestions about ways that professionals can improve communication and share responsibility with families. In the field of children's mental health there is also a small body of conceptual literature that addresses relationships between parents and professionals (Collins & Collins, 1990;McManus & Friesen, 1986;Modrcin & Robison, 1991;Vosler-Hunter, 1989), but with one recent exception (Cournoyer & Johnson, 1991) there is a lack of published research in this area.…”