It is often assumed that families move to improve their economic and social prospects, and that these additional resources can benefit the whole family. However, existing research suggests that many children who have experienced long-distance moves within a country fair worse in general compared to non-moving peers.
The KiVa Program has now been in use at the Liberty School, Paraguay, for over four years. It was not straightforward to manage to become a KiVa School – but Liberty is now a proud, satisfied and active member of the global “KiVa Schools Community”.
Children born in December are almost twice as likely to be diagnosed with a learning disorder as those born in January. ADHD was found not to affect the association between month of birth and the likelihood of a learning disability diagnosis.
Professor André Sourander has received substantial research funding from the European Research Council (ERC). Sourander received ERC Advanced Grant funding for a project “DIGIPARENT - Implementation, personalization and genetics of digitally assisted parent training intervention to improve child mental health services.
Finnish parents felt that the Let’s Cope Together website, which is based on behavioural therapy methods, helped them and their child to manage worries related to the coronavirus during the first spring of the pandemic. The website, which has been created by the Research Centre for Child Psychiatry at the University of Turku, is opened today for anonymous use. As well as the English, Finnish and Swedish versions, the content will also soon be offered in Russian and Japanese.
The Academy of Finland has made the funding decisions to strengthen the research-related profiling of Finnish universities. The University of Turku was granted €6.8 million of the Profi 6 funding. The funding supports strategic, cross-disciplinary research of the University.
A population-based study revealed reasons behind elevated suicide risk, attempted suicides, and other selfharm, which require special health care, among adolescents and young adults with autism spectrum disorders. Comorbid disorders, especially non-affective psychoses and the affective and anxiety disorders, explained the risk.
A study using extensive nationwide registry data showed that girls born extremely preterm, earlier than 28 weeks gestational age, were three times more likely to be diagnosed with depression than peers born close to the expected date of delivery. Increased risk of depression also applied to girls and boys with poor fetal growth born full-term and post-term. The effects of poor fetal growth were more evident with increasing gestational age.
The corona crisis affects the well-being, learning and education of children and adolescents in many different ways. It is likely that in most children, the long-term disadvantages of the corona crisis are related to the economic and social impacts on families with children. However, it is possible to minimise the detrimental effects on their well-being. For example, the negative effects of parental unemployment on children's education are most effectively reduced by preventing unemployment itself.
The Prime Minister’s Office appointed a 13-member multidisciplinary scientific panel to support the work of the group set up by Prime Minister Sanna Marin on the 8 April 2020 to deal with the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis. The term of the scientific panel will continue until 31 May 2020.