Aetiology

  • mother child smiling selfie

    Identifying Mental Health Difficulties in Children Living in Care: Is the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire enough?

    This blog, by Dr. Eva Sprecher, shares new findings that suggest current UK practice may not be sufficient for identifying children in care struggling with their mental health – and we suggest what might help improve things.

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  • Understanding the nature and nurture of callous-unemotional traits: The role of anxiety

    New research using the twin design reveals that anxiety levels in children with callous-unemotional (CU) traits can tell us something important about the origins of these traits.

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  • therapist talking to girl

    Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder in Children and Adolescents: Current Evidence and Clinical Practice

    Research over the past decade have refined our understanding of ADHD epidemiology, neurobiology, diagnosis, and treatment, with growing emphasis on evidence-based assessment, multimodal intervention, and shared decision-making with young people and families.

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  • Yasmin Ahmadzadeh

    Intergenerational Consequences of Racism

    Dr. Yasmin Ahmadzadeh leads a session to recognise how racism impacts families in the UK, understand how focus group discussions are used in research, and consider how public perspectives can help shape future research.

    Event type
    ACEs SIG Monthly seminars
    Location
    LIVE STREAM
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  • Boris Birmaher

    Navigating Diagnostic Challenges in Pediatric Bipolar Disorder

    We’re delighted to offer you a chance to learn from the very best – Dr. Boris Birmaher. The goal of this presentation is to present the difficulties and differential diagnosis of pediatric BD and the course and factors associated with its the course.

    Event type
    Advanced session
    Location
    LIVE STREAM
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  • Reading child and parent

    Rethinking Reading Disorders: Language Foundations, Risk Pathways, and Protective Factors

    Understanding how children learn to read requires a comprehensive understanding of language, phonology, cognition, and environmental factors. While phonological processing deficits have long been considered central to dyslexia (Snowling, 2000; Vellutino et al., 2004), growing evidence suggests that reading difficulties can emerge from multiple developmental pathways, influence by a diverse combination of risk and protective factors (Hulme & Snowling, 2016; Catts et al., 2017). These individual differences underscore why some children struggle primarily with decoding, others with comprehension, and many with both.

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  • Professor Samuele Cortese

    Practical Updates in ADHD Diagnosis and Management with Professor Samuele Cortese

    Join Professor Samuele Cortese, one of the world’s most influential researchers of the past decade, for a comprehensive 4-hour clinical expert session on ADHD, designed specifically for mental health professionals working with children, adolescents, and families. Professor Cortese was included in the list of the world’s most influential researchers of the past decade, demonstrated by the production of multiple highly-cited papers that rank in the top 1% by citations in the field of psychiatry/psychology in Web of Science.

    Event type
    Clinical Expert Session
    Location
    LIVE STREAM
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  • David Mataix-Cols

    OCD; An update on OCD and related disorders in children and young people

    Led by Professor David Mataix-Cols ; “In this session, I will provide an up-to-date overview of the latest research on OCD and related disorders, with a focus on risk factors, consequences, and evolving clinical approaches in the assessment and treatment of these disorders.”

    Event type
    Introductory and Update Session
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  • 03

    Rethinking reading disorders

    We are lucky to have one of the Titans, Professor Maggie Snowling, deliver this session on the role of language in literacy development, and address the specific challenges faced by children with language disorder.

    Event type
    Ask the expert
    Location
    LIVE STREAM
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  • Portrait of son hugging his father, together at home. Son caring for his father, putting hand on his shoulder, comforting and consoling him. Family love, bonding, care and confidence

    Social Fears in Children: The Roles of Parental Communication and Child Temperament

    A recent longitudinal study by Zeytinoglu and colleagues (2025) provides insights into how parental verbal communication and child characteristics contribute to the transmission of social fears. The study shows the impact of both positive and negative maternal statements about ambiguous social situations, finding that positive comments were linked to reductions in children’s social fear beliefs, while negative comments predicted increases, especially among children who were behaviourally inhibited or had high anxiety.

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