{"id":12711,"date":"2026-11-05T16:39:04","date_gmt":"2026-11-05T15:39:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kc-tothepoint.com\/?p=12711"},"modified":"2026-11-05T16:39:04","modified_gmt":"2026-11-05T15:39:04","slug":"how-grieving-children-see-their-caregiver-passive-negative-positive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kc-tothepoint.com\/en\/how-grieving-children-see-their-caregiver-passive-negative-positive\/","title":{"rendered":"How grieving children see their caregiver: passive, negative or positive"},"content":{"rendered":"

How does a child see their caregiver after a death, and does that go together with how the child is doing? American researchers asked the children themselves.<\/p>\n

What was studied<\/h2>\n

112 children aged 8 to 17 took part (12 on average). In the past five years they had lost someone: a parent for 60 percent, a grandparent for 22 percent and a brother or sister for 11 percent. On average this was about 13 months ago. Almost nine in ten children had already had grief support. The children filled in questionnaires about the person who looked after them day to day (the mother for 69 percent) and about their own well-being. Based on the answers, the researchers sorted the children into three groups, using a statistical method that looks for patterns (latent profile analysis).<\/p>\n

What came out of it<\/h2>\n

For 43 percent of the children, the caregiver was mostly distant or absent (passive). For 35 percent there was little supervision, little praise and difficult contact (negative). For 22 percent the caregiver was involved, warm and open to talk (positive).<\/p>\n

Children in the positive group had clearly fewer emotional and behaviour problems than children in the other two groups, and they were more resilient. The passive group sat in between: fewer problems than the negative group, but more than the positive group. A caregiver who keeps a distance does not go with ‘doing fine’. The researchers think such caregivers may feel the child can manage alone. They did not measure that.<\/p>\n

For trauma symptoms and growth after a major event, there was no difference between the groups. Children in the passive group had more often lost a parent than children in the positive group. The researchers suspect it is harder for a grieving parent to stay involved. That was not tested.<\/p>\n

How strong is this<\/h2>\n

This is a snapshot: the children were asked once. So you cannot say the caregiver makes the difference. Resilient children may also simply look for more support from their caregiver. Everything also comes from one source, the child. The caregivers were not asked how they see it.<\/p>\n

For this method, 112 children is on the small side. The researchers say themselves that groups may have been missed because of this. The children came mostly through grief centres in one region of the US. The questions were about parenting in general, not about how the caregiver deals with the death. The differences between the groups are medium to large. But the groups are a statistical sorting, not three kinds of families.<\/p>\n

What this means for practice<\/h2>\n