ASSESSING PARENTING AND PARENT-CHILD RELATIONSHIP IN DIFFERENT CLINICAL SAMPLES

The process of clinical assessment is a complex issue because of the interweaving between the child’s atypical developmental pathways and parenting. Deepening these interrelated components enhances our understanding of the child’s mental functioning and symptomatic patterns. The Symposium will analyze different perspectives on the assessment of Parenting in different clinical samples. The first contribution will deal with family relationships in the context of Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Results of this follow-up study highlight the efficacy of video-feedback intervention, which targets family coordination and the capacity to interact functionally to promote social skills in children with ASD. The second presentation will report data on families of children with Specific Language Disorders (SLD) and ASD by exploring the child’s emotional functioning and family relationships. Results point out the challenge for parents to cope with different atypical communicative patterns of children with SLD and ASD. The third contribution will concern the parents’ emotional response to childhood obesity to evaluate whether mothers’ and fathers’ body weight and parental reflective functioning are associated with children’s weight. Results highlight parental psycho-emotional mechanisms, showing evidence of the influence of parents on the development of children’s eating and weight status. The fourth contribution will present the Parent-Child Play Scale in the assessment of restrictive food intake, addressing the observation of interactions not only where child and mother are distressed but also in pleasurable settings. Results show that comparing feeding and play interactions provides an insight in the pervasiveness of parent–child relational dysfunctions and informs intervention. The Symposium will discuss the interplay among neurodevelopmental, psycho-emotional and relational mechanisms, highlighting a comprehensive focus in which the family is a fundamental reference system.