Parental Relationships Part 1: Influences and Effects for General Practitioners

The session aims to help you understand the effect of the parent-to-parent relationship on children’s health and wellbeing and to help you support families where there is relationship distress.

Learning objectives

By the end of this session you will be able to:

• Recognise the importance and effect of parental relationships on child health and wellbeing
• Describe how parental conflict and separation influences a child’s health and wellbeing
• Identify the importance of father involvement for children
• Recognise the importance of support for families experiencing distress in the parental couple relationship

There is compelling evidence that the quality of the parent-to-parent relationship has significant impact on social, psychological and educational outcomes for children. The decline in relationship satisfaction for many couples begins in the transition to parenthood and without support can lead to crisis and ultimately separation and divorce. When children experience multiple changes in their family structure in the early years of a child’s life, the outcomes for children across a range of indicators are, on average, significantly poorer.