ACAMH Website Content Types

  • The Attachment Issue

    Welcome to the May 2018 edition of the Bridge. This edition is themed around attachment in young children.

    Read more
  • Positive parenting reduces risk of callous-unemotional traits

    New data published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, from the Wirral Child Health and Development Study (WCHADS) show that a child’s responsiveness to other’s emotions may be increased by the responsiveness and warmth of their mother during infancy.

    Read more
  • Can we improve attachment or attachment-related outcomes in young children?

    Summary of attachment-related research, interventions and outcomes from Professor Jane Barlow, ex-Editor-in-Chief of the Child and Adolescent Mental Health journal.

    Read more
  • Diagnostic framework for attachment disorders needs improving

    Reactive and Disinhibited Attachment Disorders (RAD and DAD) occur when infants and young children have not been able to form an attachment to their primary caregiver, but questions have been raised as to whether these disorders are being over-diagnosed in adopted children.

    Read more
  • A harsh parenting team?

    Guest blog from Dr Rachel Latham, Postdoctoral Research Associate, King’s College London on whether high quality coparenting can buffer children’s behaviour from the negative impact of harsh parenting.

    Read more
  • Detaching RAD from DSED: the rationale and research requirements

    In order to view this content, you need to be an ACAMH member. Membership starts from just 11p a day. We hope you consider joining and being part of the advancement of child and adolescent mental health.

    Current members will need to be registered as a website user and log in, our guide to this simple process can be accessed here.

    Read more
  • Early adversity impacts on associative learning

    Exposure to adversity during childhood negatively impacts on behavioural development due to suboptimal associative learning, according to data from a new study.

    Read more
  • Low activity levels affect child mental development

    High activity levels (AL) in early childhood are associated with sub-optimal social and behavioural outcomes, but whether low AL have negative outcomes is unclear. Now, a study conducted by researchers at Boston University has demonstrated that AL are curvilinearly related to mental development.

    Read more
  • two young teen school girls with books and rucksacks

    School-based interventions

    Children and young people spend a great deal of time at school, so it has an important role to play in their development. Time spent in school impacts not just on academic and cognitive progress, but also on social interactions, peer relationships, emotional regulation and behaviour. All these areas affect, and are affected by, mental health (Fazel et al, 2014).

    Read more
  • young girl with pillow standing cant sleep

    Sleep

    Children and adolescents who are experiencing difficulties with their mental health also often struggle with their sleep. Indeed disrupted or altered sleep has been associated with most psychiatric disorders (Gregory & Sadeh, 2016). Although a range of sleep difficulties can co-occur with mental health problems, a common difficulty is insomnia. As such this guidance will primarily focus on difficulties with getting to sleep and staying asleep.

    Read more