Social-Emotional Attention in School-Age Children: A Call for School-Based Intervention during COVID-19 and Distance Learning

[Does the COVID-19 pandemic take its toll? The influence of COVID-19 induced anxiety on the social-emotional development of 12- to 13-year-olds in Austria]

During the COVID-19 pandemic, students have been severely affected by measures such as school closures and homeschooling. While it is obvious that these measures influenced students' academic achievement, there is also reason to believe that students' social-emotional development has been impacted.The present study investigates (1) the extent to which students in Austrian secondary school (12 to 13 years old) feel stressed by the COVID-19 pandemic, and (2) how the different levels of stress affect their social-emotional development. The focus of this study is on the development of problematic behavior (internalized and externalized behavior problems) and prosocial behavior. In total, 774 students participated in the study and 650 students took part in three different times of measurement, with the last time of measurement taking place just before the second school closure as a measure in the COVID-19 pandemic.Almost 20% of the respondents show higher stress-levels in terms of COVID-19 induced anxiety. Students with higher stress-levels also display a more negative development in their internalized behavior problems. Likewise, for students' development of externalized behavior problems, a trend in this direction was demonstrated, yet less pronounced. Students who reported a higher stress-level also developed more prosocial behavior. Yet, we could not statistically verify this due to violation of statistical prerequisites.

Negative effects of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic: The interlinking of maternal attachment representation, coping strategies, parental behavior, and the child's mental health

For more than two years, young families have been confronted with a large number of restrictions and following burdens as a result of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. In fact, it became evident, that the current circumstances are particularly stressful for child's mental health. With regard to the child's mental health in times of a pandemic, additional factors within the family, such as maternal attachment representations as well as coping strategies and parental behavior, may play an important role. This study aims to investigate the interplay of maternal attachment representation, coping strategies, parental behavior and child's mental health during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. In this longitudinal study, previously collected data regarding maternal attachment representation and newly attained data from the SARS-CoV-2-pandemic-assesment (lack of coping strategies, children's mental health and parental behavior) were combined and analyzed. The data were collected in an online survey since beginning of the pandemic, including N = 73 mothers. A path model was calculated in form of multiple linear regression. A path model could be confirmed, which indicates that insecure maternal attachment representation predicts lack of coping strategies during the pandemic [b = 5.55, 95%-CI = (4.51; 6.55), p = 0.001]. Furthermore, lack of coping strategies predicts harmful parental behavior during the pandemic [b = -0.77, 95%-CI = (-1.27; -0.21), p = 0.007], which in turn predicts children's mental health problems, namely behavioral problems [b = -0.08, 95%-CI = (-0.14; -0.01), p = 0.027]. Presence of short-time work and decrease in income since beginning of the pandemic were used as control variables. This means that since the pandemic mothers with insecure attachment representation have an increased risk of having only a few coping mechanisms available, leading to harmful parental behaviors and ultimately affecting the mental health of their children. In conclusion, the pandemic could potentially have a particularly negative influence on mothers with an insecure attachment type and therefore on their children. Therefore, tailored interventions for families should be offered that both focus on the different types of mental health problems in children and support parents in their coping skills.