Abstract
Children whose parents have mental disorders are more likely to be vulnerable and exposed to an environment where they may not be cared for by parents or guardians in Korea. Particularly, young children often develop mental disorders or maladaptive behaviors. This study aimed to implement a structured program to enhance the resilience of school-aged children whose parents have mental disorders and to analyze its effectiveness through a single-group pretest–posttest experimental design. The Korean Child Personality Inventory for Self-Report self-resilience and clinical scales were used, and daily behavioral observation logs showed decreases in psychosis scores among all children, anxiety scores among girls, and somatization and physical development among boys. Self-efficacy, social competency, and acceptance toward families increased. Therefore, the improvement of resilience and clinical symptoms was confirmed through this program, suggesting it should be expanded and developed in local community healthcare sites to help support children with mentally ill parents.
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank the children for participating in the study.
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This research was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Ministry of Education (2017R1D1A3B03036113).
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by S.I. and M.H. The first draft of the manuscript was written by S.I. and M.H. and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. The study was approved by the Bioethics Committee of E University (IRB No. EU18-22)
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Im, S., Heo, M.L. Children in the Blind Spot of Social Medical Concerns: Supporting Children with Mentally Ill Parents in Korea. Community Ment Health J 57, 1525–1536 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10597-020-00772-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10597-020-00772-8