Family factors of psychosomatic disorders in children and adolescents

Abstract

This article presents the results of a comparative study of families of children and adolescents with organic psychosomatic disorders (182 children and 194 parents) and functional psychosomatic disorders (185 children and 214 parents) with families of their healthy peers who do not suffer from psychosomatic disorders (100 children and 84 parents). Analyze of parent¬child relationships, characteristics of parental upbringing, the quality of children's attachment to a significant figures. The several dysfunctional communications in the families of children and adolescents with different levels of psychosomatic pathology are revealed: a high level of parental criticism and elimination of emotions combined with a high level of family perfectionism and anxiety inducing. Adolescent attachment to parents is characterized by emotional ambivalence: the simultaneous combination of trust and rejection in relation to significant figures. This study found that the level of protection of parents towards their own child is directly related to an inadequate level of care received by parents in their own family of origin.

Keywords

• psychosomatic disorder
• children
• adolescents
• family dysfunctions
• attachment
• family emotional communication