| Abstract [eng] |
Social risk families in Lithuania are a part of society that needs professional help. These families face daily challenges related to addictions and lack of parenting skills. Mothers of this group are important for the whole quality of family life. Mothers directly influence the development of their children. Currently, there is a lack of studies revealing how much mothersʼ childhood experiences have consequences for their current life. It is not clear what characteristics of mothersʼ mentalization, mind-mindedness are associated with the behavioural and emotional difficulties of their children. The purpose of this thesis is to study and compare the relationship between social risk and general population group mothersʼ early traumatic experiences, mentalization, understanding of the child's internal mental states and behavioural and emotional difficulties for children of 3-4 years old. The study included 40 mothers; 20 mothers belonged to social risk group families. All mothers raised children of 3-4 years old during the study period. The age of study participants ranges from 20 to 42 years (M = 29,45, SD = 4,391). The study participants answered questions of Mind-Mindedness interview (MM) (Meins, Fernyhough, Russell & Clark-Carter, 1998) and filled in following surveys: Mentalization Scale (MentS) (Dimitrijevic, Hanak, & Marjanovic, 2017), adult version of the Childhood Experiences Questionnaire (Dube et al., 2001), Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire for parents (Goodman, 1997), and identified demographic and social risk-related family variables. The results of the study revealed that mothers in risk group experienced significantly more traumatic experiences in early childhood than mothers in the general population. Evaluations of the mentalization characteristics of mothers in the risk group (perception of their own mental states, perception of othersʼ mental states and motivation for mentalization) and understanding of their childrenʼs mind-mindedness were lower than those of the mothers in the general population. The results showed that lower maternal mentalization characteristics are associated with emotional and behavioural difficulties for children of 3-4 years old and understanding of mothersʼ childrenʼs internal mental states is negatively associated with young childrenʼs emotional and behavioural difficulties. The results of the study have broadened the knowledge of the relationship between mothersʼ early traumatic experiences, mentalization, mind-mindedness with behavioural and emotional difficulties for children of 3-4 years old and can be applied to the development of psychological interventions for social risk families. |
