Providing space for children’s voices to be heard, listening to their ideas and giving due weight to their propositions, on all matters that affect them, describes the concept of participation rights according to the United Nations Convention of the Rights of the Child. Promoting children’s participation as a right from an early age is essential for building democratic values and citizenship, a core principle for EU members and one of the quality criteria for Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) Institutions. Within the framework of children’s participation rights, conditions that may foster or hinder teachers’ efforts to create a participatory atmosphere need to be investigated. This study focused on ECEC teachers and coordinators’ subjective experience, as key players in promoting high-quality educational experiences and as gatekeepers for establishing a rights-based participation culture in ECEC, to unveil conditions for children’s participation. Focus groups were conducted in four European countries – Belgium, Greece, Poland, and Portugal – involving 50 participants. A reflexive latent content analysis was followed, using Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological theory alongside the structural, process, and orientational quality dimensions of ECEC, to organize and interpret conditions described by participants. The horizontal level of analysis revealed quality parameters across countries organized in four themes: Organizational Culture, teachers’ Professional Profiles, Organization of ECEC Environment, and Collaboration among Professionals. Vertical analysis highlighted country-specific conditions referring to Administrative issues, Children characteristics, Teacher characteristics, Pedagogical work, and Family-school relationship. A synthesis of these two levels of analysis resulted in a framework of ecological and quality parameters, as drivers or barriers of participatory strategies influencing implementation of participatory pedagogies in diverse layers of the system with implications regarding pedagogical practice, professional development, research, and policymaking.
Child maltreatment is a severe public health issue with profound implications for individuals' well-being. Parenting programs have emerged as effective strategies for preventing child maltreatment, but the mixed results and methodological and conceptual challenges found in previous research obstruct a comprehensive understanding of their effects. This systematic review aims to examine (1) the characteristics of secondary prevention programs targeting at-risk parents and children with pre-existing risk factors for child maltreatment, (2) the methodological characteristics of the studies that have evaluated the impact of those programs, and (3) the main findings regarding the impact of those prevention programs. The review encompasses studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals between January 2010 and December 2025, in both English and Portuguese. A systematic search was conducted across multiple databases, including B-On: Online Knowledge Library–Search, Google Scholar, Ovid, ProQuest, PsycINFO and Web of Knowledge, following the PRISMA guidelines. Sixty-four studies met the inclusion criteria and provided valuable insights into the methodological characteristics of the reviewed empirical studies, the features of the maltreatment prevention programs, and their main outcomes. Overall, the findings provide evidence to support the positive impact of secondary prevention programs on child and youth outcomes, parenting outcomes, parent-child relationships, and family outcomes. However, the limitations identified in the studies included in this review emphasize the need for future research to include longer follow-up periods, enabling a comprehensive assessment of changes and variations in intervention outcomes and effectiveness over time. This study underlines the importance of prioritizing social policies and advancing research efforts to prevent child maltreatment.
In Iran, as in many other countries, the absence of comprehensive surveillance systems and reliable direct data complicates the accurate estimation of child labor prevalence. To bridge this evidence gap, the present study employed the Active Population Ratio (APR) as a proxy indicator to estimate the prevalence and provincial distribution of child labor. This descriptive-analytical study drew on data from Iran’s National Population and Housing Censuses (2006, 2011, and 2016). The APR for children aged 10–17 was first calculated and disaggregated by sex, age group, and urban/rural residence at the provincial level using Microsoft Excel. Provincial Human Development Index (HDI) scores were obtained from published estimates. Finally, The Concentration Index (CI) was computed using Stata to quantify inequality in the distribution of APR across provinces by HDI level. The national APR fell from 9.6
Cash transfers have increasingly become a popular method for delivering humanitarian assistance, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, there is limited evidence on the impact of cash transfers on multi-dimensional poverty among refugee children. We combine the Alkire–Foster approach to measuring multidimensional poverty with Propensity Score Matching to estimate the impact of a labeled cash transfer on multidimensional poverty among school-aged refugee children in Uganda’s Kyaka II refugee settlement. We found that the cash transfer had a statistically significant positive effect on multidimensional poverty of 7
Risk perception in early childhood is a multidimensional construct that directly shapes children’s ability to cope with uncertainty, their development of autonomy, and their everyday lived experiences. Yet the existing literature has largely confined the concept of risk to the context of physical play, leaving its cognitive, emotional, and social dimensions relatively underexplored. The present study aimed to examine the risk perceptions of children aged 60–72 months and their parents across cognitive, emotional, physical, and social dimensions. The study was conducted using a phenomenological design, with a sample consisting of 17 children and 11 parents enrolled in a preschool. Data were collected through semi-structured interview forms enriched with AI-assisted visualization tools and analyzed using content analysis. The analysis employed both theory-driven codes derived from the four risk dimensions and inductively generated codes emerging from the data, enabling a nuanced mapping of participants’ risk-related experiences. Risk perception was operationalized across four dimensions: physical risk (exposure to potential bodily harm), emotional risk (vulnerability to negative affective experiences such as rejection or ridicule), social risk (uncertainty about others’ reactions and judgments in interpersonal contexts), and cognitive risk (the possibility of failure or error in task-related situations). Findings revealed that the risk perceptions of both children and parents were organized around distinct themes. Significant gender-based differences were identified among children, and risk awareness was found to follow a declining pattern from concrete to abstract dimensions. Among parents, protective tendencies were prominent; however, the balance between safety and autonomy varied considerably from one parent to another. Overall, the findings suggest that risk perception in early childhood reflects an individualized and multidimensional structure, and that overly protective approaches may constrain the development of children’s risk management skills.
This study investigates the relationships between community environment, parenting practices, social support, and children’s quality of life in Shanghai. Grounded in a “4D” framework (Density, Design, Diversity, and Destination), we employed a multi-scalar geospatial approach using 300-meter, 500-meter, 1000-meter, and 1500-meter residential buffers to address the uncertain geographic context problem. Path analysis was used to examine direct and indirect effects. Our results indicate a consistent pattern of attenuation beyond 500 m - observed across multiple community attributes, supporting Shanghai’s 15-minute community life cycle policy. Green park space at 300 m showed a significant direct positive association with children’s quality of life. Residential density and shopping services operated indirectly through parenting practices at both 300 and 500 m. Notably, street connectivity and land use mix showed no significant associations, which differs from the Western context. Social support was consistently predicted by parenting practices, not directly by any community feature. A critical gendered analysis revealed pronounced differences: girls showed more environmental types and more indirect (parenting-mediated) pathways across all buffers. At the same time, boys demonstrated only one significant effect - a direct positive association with green park space at 300 m - with no parenting-mediated pathways. This research provides spatially-sensitive evidence to help urban planners create child-friendly communities through hyper-local interventions (300–500 m), balanced green space design (active parks and vegetated areas), family-supportive density, and gender-responsive design supporting diverse patterns of parenting and child activity.
Bullying in early childhood poses significant risks to children’s emotional, psychological, social, and physical well-being. As one of the earliest forms of literature encountered by young children, picturebooks play an important role in shaping children’s understanding of peer relationships, social behavior, and responses to bullying. Despite their widespread use in early childhood education, relatively little is known about the broader well-being messages they communicate. This study employed qualitative content analysis to examine how bullying is portrayed from a child well-being perspective in 37 picturebooks available to children in Türkiye. Four themes were identified: (1) narrative and representational characteristics of bullying, (2) portrayals of bullying, (3) consequences of bullying for children’s well-being, and (4) protective messages supporting children’s well-being. Findings indicated that verbal bullying was the most frequently represented type of bullying and that human perpetrators were predominantly portrayed as male, whereas human victims were more often portrayed as female. Narratives most frequently attributed victimization to individual differences, particularly visible physical characteristics, whereas bullying behavior was primarily motivated by amusement and the pursuit of power or dominance. Bullying was portrayed as affecting multiple dimensions of children’s well-being, including emotional distress, psychological difficulties, social withdrawal, reduced participation in everyday activities, and, less frequently, somatic symptoms. In addition, picturebooks consistently conveyed that children’s well-being could be protected and restored through supportive relationships, positive self-perceptions, and adaptive coping. These findings provide practical guidance for selecting and using picturebooks to support bullying prevention and promote children’s well-being.
Sibling relationships constitute an important developmental context; however, research on these relationships remains underrepresented compared with research on parent–child and peer relationships and is dispersed across different disciplines. Therefore, a field-level examination is needed to identify the intellectual structure, dominant themes, and research gaps in this literature. This study conducted a Web of Science–based bibliometric analysis of research on sibling relationships during childhood and adolescence. A systematic search of the Web of Science Core Collection identified 1,629 publications published between 1980 and 2025. Performance analyses were conducted using the Bibliometrix package to examine publication and citation trends, journal performance, author productivity according to Lotka’s Law, influential publications, and trend topics. Science-mapping analyses were conducted using VOSviewer to examine co-word patterns and international collaboration networks. The findings showed a marked increase in scholarly output after 2005 and a concentration of research in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada. Highly cited publications primarily focused on sibling relationship quality, family-system processes, developmental patterns, and child and adolescent adjustment. Co-word analysis identified six major thematic clusters: developmental and individual differences; sibling experiences in families of children with disabilities; psychological well-being and mental health; relationship quality and parenting; protection and traumatic experiences; and social support and adjustment. Recent trend topics included relationship quality, emotion regulation, mental health, COVID-19, sibling bullying, and autism. Despite substantial growth, the Web of Science–indexed literature remains geographically concentrated and provides limited representation of diverse cultural contexts. Future research should prioritize culturally sensitive comparative studies, longitudinal and mixed-methods designs, and broader database coverage. Overall, sibling relationships represent a multidimensional developmental context with important implications for social-emotional functioning, resilience, and family-system dynamics.
This exploratory study employed a person-centered, two-step cluster approach to identify lifetime victimization profiles across adolescents in both residential care and community settings. Data were collected from 116 adolescents in residential care and 241 adolescents from the community, boys and girls aged 12 to 17 years old. Participants completed an adapted version of the Juvenile Victimization Questionnaire comprising details on the chronicity and perpetration of 40 interpersonal violence events. Three distinct clusters emerged: (1) less victimized, (2) moderately victimized, (3) severely victimized. Cluster 1 is composed of adolescents with low levels of lifetime victimization, representing a group whose experiences were largely isolated and perpetrated by a single relational source. Cluster 2 reflects a moderate severity profile characterized by low-to mid-level polyvictimization, chronic exposure, and multiple perpetrators, and is predominantly composed of adolescents from the community. Cluster 3 shares the presence of exclusively chronic victimization and exposure to multiple perpetrators with Cluster 2 but is predominantly composed of adolescents in RC and high-polyvictims. Findings suggest that victimization trajectories of adolescents are primarily shaped by what they experience (cumulative exposure, chronicity of interpersonal violence events, and perpetrator diversity) and not by who they are (sex, age) or the context they live in (RC, community). There is a need for preventive measures that minimize vulnerabilities while enhancing protective skills and resources.
In this study, we integrate two perspectives on inequalities in children’s leisure-time activities: families' cultural and economic resources. In contrast to previous research, we examine organised and unorganised leisure-time activities separately while also distinguishing between sports and cultural activities. We ask: (1) To what extent do maternal educational attainment and the family’s perceived economic situation explain participation in organised and unorganised sports and cultural leisure-time activities? (2) Does the association between the family's perceived economic situation and participation in organised and unorganised leisure-time activities vary according to maternal educational attainment? We use survey data from the 2019 Finnish School Health Promotion study (n = 87 283), a nationwide survey conducted among all 8th- and 9th-grade pupils in Finnish comprehensive schools. Methodologically, we employ descriptive statistics and linear probability modelling, with schools specified as the second-level grouping variable. We find that children’s leisure-time activities varies according to maternal educational attainment and the family’s perceived economic situation. However, these patterns manifest differently in sports and cultural activities. Although the association between the family’s perceived economic situation and the examined leisure-time activities varies across levels of maternal education, these differences are generally modest. Our findings provide new insights into the mechanisms through which social inequalities are reflected in children’s leisure-time participation.
Existing research suggests that everyday classroom verbal practices may be associated with students’ experiences of belonging, emotional security, visibility, and participation. However, understanding remains limited regarding how such practices, when considered collectively and within context, may function as indicators of school well-being in refugee students’ classroom experiences. Therefore, this study aims to identify classroom verbal communication practices associated with school well-being among Syrian refugee students in Türkiye and to examine how these practices may be interpreted as communication-based indicators for monitoring school well-being. The study adopted a qualitative embedded single-case design. Data were collected through focus group discussions, semi-structured teacher interviews, and three weeks of classroom observations involving 25 Syrian students in grades 5 and 6 and six teachers. Verbal communication examples drawn from dictionaries in a previous project were used as elicitation materials addressing greetings and forms of address, humor, short narratives, Arabic–Turkish code-switching, and microtoponyms. Data were analyzed using Braun and Clarke’s thematic analysis. The findings indicate that correct name use, greeting routines, inclusive humor, supportive teacher and peer language, strategic code-switching, and microtoponym sharing were associated with belonging, emotional security, social participation, classroom visibility, self-confidence, and academic participation. Conversely, misnaming, exclusionary humor, suppression of native-language use, and negative labeling of microtoponyms were associated with reduced emotional security, withdrawal, and silence. The findings suggest that everyday classroom verbal practices may serve as communication-based indicators for monitoring school well-being among vulnerable migrant students and offer implications for teacher training, the development of inclusive classroom climates, and education policy.
Research has documented significant gender gaps in subjective well-being among adolescents in residential care, with girls reporting lower life satisfaction than boys. As well-being is considered an everyday experience, adolescents in residential care are expected to have particular views on what counts as a good life. This qualitative study explores the well-being experiences of adolescents living in care residences in Santiago from a gendered perspective. We conducted four group workshops with 35 adolescents (aged 12 to 18) residing in gender-differentiated facilities in Santiago, Chile. Participants completed fanzines and engaged in facilitated discussions about their daily experiences living in the residences. Results revealed that residential infrastructure, rules and regulations, routines, and relationships are integral dimensions to participants’ daily experiences. Within those dimensions, participants highlighted their wish to be treated with trust and practice autonomy, and criticized institutional constraints—surveillance, rigid rules, limited control over daily activities—that restricted decision-making. These findings suggest that promoting well-being in residential care requires reconceiving autonomy as relational—fostered through trust, participation, and flexible institutional practices—while remaining responsive to gender-specific needs, such as those of girls whose entry into care is often linked to sexual violence.
This paper examines schooling and learning outcomes of children with disabilities in Ghana. We used data from the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) and linear regression models to estimate the relationship between disability status and schooling and learning outcomes of children aged 5 to 17 years. We then explore the sources of the gaps in schooling and learning outcomes by decomposing the disability gaps into explained and unexplained components. Our results show that disability is associated with poor schooling and learning outcomes for children in Ghana. We find that ities are less likely to be enrolled in school and those who have enrolled are less likely to be in the grade appropriate for their age. Children with disabilities also recorded lower performance in reading tests compared to children without disabilities. We also find that the disability gap in schooling and learning outcomes arises from unexplained factors, which may include institutional and structural factors, rather than differences in observable characteristics between children with and without disabilities. Addressing these gaps requires targeted policy interventions, including investment in disability-accessible infrastructure, inclusive teaching pedagogies, and stronger enforcement of inclusive education laws and policies to ensure that children with disabilities have equitable access to schooling and learning opportunities.
This study explores the lived experiences of Syrian refugee families raising children with disabilities in Türkiye, examining the multilayered vulnerabilities, constrained capabilities, and forms of resilience that emerge at the intersection of war, forced migration, disability, and caregiving. Drawing on intersectionality and the capability approach, this study employs a constructivist grounded theory design to generate an explanatory model of caregiving during displacement. Qualitative data were collected through in-depth interviews with 13 Syrian parents (nine mothers and four fathers) caring for 17 children with intellectual, physical, hearing, speech, or visual impairments in Kilis, Türkiye. Analysis following Charmaz’s grounded theory procedures identified six interconnected themes: (1) diagnostic processes and encounters with the healthcare system, (2) impact of migration and new living conditions, (3) access to services and support mechanisms, (4) Gendered Care Responsibilities and Family Roles, (5) experiences of exclusion and double stigma, and (6) resilience and future expectations. The findings show that delayed diagnosis, language and bureaucratic barriers, fragmented services, gendered care responsibilities, and social exclusion produce layered precarity in families’ everyday lives, while families develop fragile yet persistent forms of resilience within constrained institutional settings. This study proposes a model of layered precarity and constrained capabilities and underscores the need for inclusive, rights-based, culturally responsive, and gender-sensitive service systems for refugee children with disabilities and their families.
Material hardship experiences during childhood have been shown to negatively impact development. Existing longitudinal research points to variability in hardship across childhood but less is known about how persistence and age-graded hardship experiences are associated with early adolescent outcomes. To examine such associations, we used data from the Growing Up in New Zealand study, a prospective birth cohort of 6,853 children recruited antenatally and followed up regularly with their families from pregnancy. To investigate longitudinal experiences of material hardship, we applied social sequence analysis to measures assessed at five time points: 9-months, 2-years, 4.5-years, 8-years, and 12-years. We identified four distinct groups:‘no material hardship’, ‘early hardship’, ‘increasing hardship’, and ‘persistent hardship’. To examine associations between hardship groups and internalizing and externalizing symptoms at age 12, multivariable regression models were used for those with available outcome data (n = 4,431). Compared to the reference group of ‘no material hardship’, all groups exposed to material hardship were associated with increased internalizing and externalizing symptoms. In the fully adjusted models, experiencing ‘persistent hardship’ was most strongly associated with higher internalizing symptoms (B = 1.28, SE = 0.21), whereas ‘increasing hardship’ was most strongly associated with higher externalizing symptoms (B = 0.98, SE = 0.15). The findings provide support for policies that both disrupt persistent hardship and prevent families from falling into hardship to begin with.
The construction of Child-Friendly Cities has become an international priority, yet existing evaluation systems continue to emphasize physical safety infrastructure while overlooking children’s lived experiences. This study addresses the gap between administrative provision and children’s experiential requirements as reflected through commuting satisfaction by examining school commuting environments in three pilot communities in Nanjing, China. Using a mixed quantitative approach, data were collected from 237 primary school children. Fuzzy Comprehensive Evaluation was applied to assess the current satisfaction levels, and Structural Equation Modeling was used to identify the latent factors shaping these perceptions. The results reveal a pronounced importance–performance mismatch. Although children expressed high satisfaction with “hard” infrastructure such as sidewalks and traffic control facilities, these elements showed limited contribution to overall satisfaction. In contrast, “soft” dimensions, particularly leisure facilities and community engagement, received the lowest satisfaction ratings yet emerged as the strongest predictors of children’s well-being. Demographic analysis further showed that satisfaction declines with age, indicating that older children’s growing need for autonomy is insufficiently supported by the existing safety-centered environment. The study concludes that future Child-Friendly Cities interventions should extend beyond risk management toward experiential place making, emphasizing small-scale, playful, and socially supportive elements along school routes to meet the higher-order developmental needs of children.
High levels of life satisfaction have important positive implications for the development of adolescents. Despite studies that have examined factors that may favour life satisfaction at these ages, researchers have described a lack of research on this subject using both prospective designs and samples of adolescents. Given that gratitude has been shown to be one of the resources that fosters well-being and health, this study sought to delve into the possible underlying mechanisms in the relationship between gratitude and life satisfaction in adolescents. To do so, based on two theoretical hypotheses, we examined the role of two possible mediators in this relationship: positive affect (positive affect hypothesis) and adaptive cognitive emotion regulation (CER) strategies (coping hypothesis). A sample of 983 students (12–18 years old) participated in this two-wave study. At Time 1 they completed two questionnaire measuring gratitude and life satisfaction. At Time 2 (16 weeks later) participants completed three questionnaires assessing positive affect, adaptive CER strategies, and life satisfaction. The results showed that gratitude had an association on life satisfaction over time. Moreover, according to the positive affect and coping hypotheses, both positive affect and adaptive CER strategies mediated the association between gratitude and life satisfaction over time, after controlling life satisfaction (Time 1). These findings provide a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying the relationship between gratitude and life satisfaction in adolescents. They also suggest the importance of health and well-being benefits of training this resource at these ages.
Early childhood development is increasingly recognized as a central dimension of child well-being and an essential component of child indicator frameworks used to monitor social progress. The objective of this study is to examine disparities in early childhood development in Algeria using nationally representative data from the 2019 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS). The analysis covered all children aged between 36 and 59 months included in the database and used the Early Childhood Development Index (ECDI) as the main assessment criterion. Using complex sample logistic regression models, the total and direct associations between socio-economic factors and developmental status were assessed. A directed acyclic graph (DAG) guided covariate selection and informed the distinction between total association models and models adjusting for hypothesized mediating pathways (nutritional status and home stimulation). Interaction between household wealth and place of residence was also examined. Among the 6,146 children listed, 70.5
Flourishing is increasingly conceptualized within integrative developmental frameworks that consider dynamic biopsychosocial interactions in a child’s ecology. However, there is limited research on how individual, household, and neighborhood factors interact with children’s flourishing, mental health, and school engagement. We used data from a representative sample of U.S. children (n = 62,789; 48.23
