Tag: Academic research

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Genetic Map Opens Door to Development of New Therapies to Reverse Bone Loss

An international team of scientists report that they have successfully mapped the cells and genes that regulate bone formation and loss and discovered the critical role that blood vessel cells play in bone health. By combining genomic sequencing with data from half a million individuals, the research team identified hundreds of previously unknown genes that govern bone health and revealed cells surrounding blood vessels as one of the drivers of bone repair.

The study “Multiscale analysis and functional validation of the cellular and genetic determinants of skeletal disease” is published in Nature Genetics. The team says its findings fundamentally enhance our understanding of skeletal disease. It is hoped the discovery will enable the development of new therapies to rebuild lost bone, offering hope to almost half of all individuals over 50 living with rare and common skeletal conditions such as osteoporosis, osteoarthritis and osteogenesis imperfecta, as well as those with rare bone disorders and cancers that spread to bone.

“Most people don’t realize that bones are constantly changing; the human body replaces its skeleton every 10 years or so,” said Peter Croucher, PhD, professor at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Australia. “This is a hugely important process, but until now we’ve had a limited understanding of the cells and mechanisms that control this turnover of bone. “Most of the drugs now available focus only on halting bone disease, rather than rebuilding lost bone, which is really important for reversing damage.”

Detailed map of cells and genes that regulate bone health

The team used single-cell RNA sequencing to measure which genes are switched on within individual cells found in bone, focusing on the interface between the hard bone and bone marrow which is the key site for the formation and breakdown of bone.

The Institute’s Ryan Chai, PhD, pointed out that the team’s analysis found 34 different groups of cells and defined the genes that are active in each of these cell types. “To our surprise, more than half of the genes identified have never before been shown to play a role in maintaining bone health, which is a significant finding,” he added.

Ryan Chai, PhD, and Peter Croucher, PhD, from the Garvan Institute of Medical Research. [Garvan Institute]
Ryan Chai, PhD, and Peter Croucher, PhD, from the Garvan Institute of Medical Research [Garvan Institute]

The team used its map to identify cells involved in rare and common skeletal diseases, including osteogenesis imperfecta and osteoporosis. For the latter, the researchers analyzed the UK Biobank, one of the world’s biggest and most comprehensive collections of biological samples.

By analyzing genetic and bone density data from half a million people participating in the UK Biobank, the team was able to pinpoint exactly which cells drive skeletal disease, according to John Kemp, PhD, associate professor from Mater Research.

“These include cells known to regulate bone formation and bone loss, as well as blood vessel cells that, until now, have had underappreciated roles in bone health,” he said.

Croucher explained that the research uncovered new therapeutic opportunities against not only bone disease, but also cancer. “Bone is the main hiding place for dormant cancer cells and a common site of relapse, so identifying the cells and genes that drive bone turnover also opens new opportunities to prevent cancer metastasis,” he said.

The team is now further investigating the roles of newly discovered bone-regulating cells and genes in the hope of developing new medicines against these targets. Its data has been made accessible to medical researchers worldwide through an open access platform.

 

 

The post Genetic Map Opens Door to Development of New Therapies to Reverse Bone Loss appeared first on GEN – Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News.

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STAT+: HHS presses ahead with effort to curb antidepressant use

WASHINGTON — Health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is pressing forward with his effort to help Americans stop taking psychiatric drugs, a medical practice known as deprescribing.

Earlier this month, dozens of mental health professionals met with federal health officials to map out forthcoming clinical guidance they hope will help providers instruct patients on how to come off of antidepressant medications. While the Department of Health and Human Services has discussed plans to hold such a meeting, the outlines of the discussion haven’t been reported.

During those talks, they reviewed guidance from European nations and worked on recommendations for nonmedication-based options for patients to address their mental health, such as therapy. A senior HHS official said they discussed gaps in the research around deprescribing SSRIs, including the side effects a person may experience, which vary depending on the drug and how long the person was on it, and how to recognize the difference between those side effects and a return of a patient’s depressive symptoms.

Continue to STAT+ to read the full story…

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Personalized Brain Health Service and Dementia Prevention

Conditions: Subjective Cognitive Decline (SCD)

Interventions: Behavioral: Multimodal Lifestyle Intervention; Behavioral: Lifestyle Recommendations and Counseling

Sponsors: Barcelonabeta Brain Research Center, Pasqual Maragall Foundation; Hospital del Mar; Hospital del Mar Research Institute

Not yet recruiting
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Treating Gum Disease Could Prevent Most Common Heart Valve Disease

Scientists have discovered that the bacteria causing gum disease can drive calcium buildup and narrowing of the heart’s aortic valve, leading to calcific aortic valve stenosis (CAVS). Presented today at the American Heart Association’s Basic Cardiovascular Sciences Scientific Sessions 2026, these preliminary findings suggest that treating gum disease and the inflammation caused by bacteria could prevent this common heart condition.  

“This study adds to the growing evidence that oral health and heart health are closely connected,” said Eduardo Sanchez, MD, chief medical officer for prevention for the American Heart Association. “For many people, regular visits to the dentist are their only connection to the healthcare system. That makes dental professionals important partners in spotting health conditions, including periodontal disease early—which can lead to quicker healthcare referrals and results, better health and lives saved.”

Calcific aortic valve stenosis (CAVS) is the most prevalent valvular heart disease worldwide. Although it may not show symptoms early on, as the aortic valve thickens and restricts blood flow, patients will increasingly experience fatigue, chest pain, shortness of breath, fainting, heart failure and in some cases premature death. Currently, the only treatment option for CAVS patients is valve replacement surgery. 

“There are currently no medications proven to prevent or slow the progression of CAVS,” said Chenyang Li, MD, a PhD candidate at Fuwai Hospital’s National Center for Cardiovascular Diseases and co-lead author of the study. “We hope our findings demonstrating the link between periodontal disease and CAVS will stimulate further research into new preventive and therapeutic approaches for this condition.”

Li’s team profiled the bacterial communities present in aortic valves from patients undergoing valve replacement surgery, comparing those with severe CAVS to patients with other valvular diseases. Results showed a clear link between CAVS and the presence of Porphyromonas gingivalis bacteria, which have previously been linked with systemic inflammation and a higher risk of cardiovascular disease. 

“We were surprised by how much P. gingivalis was present in the calcified aortic valves,” said Li. “Although it was not one of the most abundant bacteria overall, it showed one of the largest differences between valves with CAVS and valves without CAVS. This unexpected finding led us to investigate its potential role in the development of CAVS.”

In mice, repeated exposure to P. gingivalis led to their accumulation in aortic valves, increasing calcification and other symptoms of CAVS. A preventive antibiotic treatment significantly reduced these effects. 

Further studies in human valve cells revealed that the bacteria drive inflammation by activating IL-1β signaling pathways. Knocking out expression of the IL-1β protein in mice reduced calcification and CAVS symptoms even in the presence of P. gingivalis, pointing to a potential therapeutic target for CAVS.

“The key message is simple: take good care of your oral health,” Li said. ”Good oral hygiene and treatment of periodontal disease are important for overall health and may also have benefits for cardiovascular health. While it is still too early to recommend specific treatments for preventing CAVS, our findings suggest that periodontal health could be an important piece of the puzzle.”

The post Treating Gum Disease Could Prevent Most Common Heart Valve Disease appeared first on Inside Precision Medicine.

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Simple Test Can Rule Out Pulmonary Embolism in Cancer Patients

A simple test that involves answering several clinical questions and completing a blood test can accurately predict if cancer patients have a blockage in one of the arteries leading to the lungs.

The YEARS algorithm was non-inferior to doing a computed tomography pulmonary angiography (CTPA) scan, which is current common practice for cancer patients with a suspected pulmonary embolism.

As reported in JAMA, 22% of patients in the study did not need to have CT scanning at all, avoiding a more invasive form of screening that also exposes patients to radiation.

Patients with active cancer have an estimated 11-fold increase in risk for blood clotting events such as venous thromboembolism or pulmonary embolism compared with people without cancer. Until now, guidelines specifically cautioned against using clinical decision rules like YEARS in cancer patients, leaving clinicians with no validated alternative to CT scanning.

While CTPA is an accurate way to diagnose a pulmonary embolism, it requires patients be injected with contrast dye and scanned in a hospital setting, which is a relatively invasive an expensive option for patients who already have cancer.

The YEARS algorithm requires answers to three questions: does the patient have signs of deep vein thrombosis, are they coughing up blood, and does the clinician think pulmonary embolism is the most likely diagnosis? A blood test measuring D-dimer, a measure of recent clot formation in the body, is also required.

If the answers to the questions are all no, the D-dimer test must be below 1000 ng/ml, whereas if one or more questions are answered in the affirmative then the D-dimer level has to be below 500 ng/ml.  If it is above these levels then patients are referred for CTPA scanning.

In this study, Menno Huisman, MD, PhD, a clinician researcher at Leiden University Medical Center, and colleagues tested whether the YEARS algorithm could safely replace CTPA for cancer patients. Researchers randomized 698 cancer patients with suspected pulmonary embolism across 21 hospitals in six European countries. Half were assigned to YEARS-guided management and half to immediate CTPA.

The researchers measured diagnostic failure, defined as a missed pulmonary embolism or death from this cause within 90 days of testing, and reported a rate of 1.8% in the YEARS group versus 5.5% in the CTPA-only group. Almost a quarter of the YEARS group managed to avoid having CTPA altogether.

“Even though the majority of patients with cancer and suspected pulmonary embolism still have to undergo CTPA, the use of the YEARS algorithm in this setting will result in a substantial annual reduction in the total number of CTPAs performed,” write the authors. If widely adopted, they estimate use of YEARS could eliminate 70,000–80,000 unnecessary CT scans annually in the U.S. alone.

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Brain Scans Reveal Dopamine Damage in Long COVID, Pointing to New Treatments

New brain imaging research has provided the strongest evidence to date that long COVID is associated with injury to the brain’s dopamine system, offering a potential biological explanation for persistent symptoms such as fatigue, slowed movement, lack of motivation, and memory problems.

The study, published in eBioMedicine by researchers at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Canada, used positron emission tomography (PET) imaging to examine dopamine-releasing neurons in people with long COVID. The findings suggest that reduced dopamine nerve terminal density in key brain regions may underlie many of the neurological symptoms experienced by patients and identify a potential therapeutic target for future treatments.

Long COVID is estimated to affect approximately nine million adults in the United States and about 5% of the global population, making it one of the most common chronic conditions to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic. The condition is characterized by symptoms that persist for at least three months after the initial SARS-CoV-2 infection and commonly includes fatigue, brain fog, memory impairment, and mood changes. Despite its prevalence, there are currently no evidence-based treatments, largely because the biological mechanisms driving these symptoms remain poorly understood.

To investigate whether the brain’s dopamine system is involved, the researchers used PET imaging to measure a well-established marker of dopamine neuron integrity in individuals with long COVID and healthy control participants.

Compared with healthy volunteers, participants with long COVID had significantly lower levels of the dopamine neuron marker throughout the striatum, a brain region that plays a central role in motivation, movement, learning, and cognition. The reduced signal indicates a loss of dopamine nerve terminal density, providing direct evidence that dopamine-releasing neurons are injured in long COVID.

The imaging findings also closely matched patients’ clinical symptoms. Lower dopamine markers in the ventral striatum were associated with greater loss of motivation, reductions in the dorsal putamen correlated with slower movement, and lower marker levels in the caudate were linked to poorer memory performance. The pattern suggests that damage within specific regions of the dopamine system may contribute to distinct neurological symptoms experienced by people with long COVID.

The findings build on the research group’s earlier work demonstrating elevated inflammation in the brains of people with long COVID, particularly in regions rich in dopamine-producing neurons. Because inflammation is known to damage dopamine neurons in other neurological disorders, the new study provides direct evidence that this inflammatory process may be accompanied by measurable injury to the brain’s dopamine system. The close relationship between dopamine neuron loss and symptom severity further strengthens the case that dopamine dysfunction plays a central role in the condition.

The study also shifts attention beyond inflammation alone and suggests that long COVID should be considered, at least in part, a disorder affecting the brain’s dopamine system. That conclusion has important therapeutic implications because several medications already approved for other neurological disorders increase dopamine availability or enhance dopamine signaling. The researchers suggest that repurposing dopamine precursors or drugs that inhibit dopamine metabolism could represent a promising strategy for treating persistent cognitive and neurological symptoms associated with long COVID.

The findings also provide biological evidence supporting the experiences of people living with long COVID, many of whom have struggled for years with debilitating symptoms despite the absence of clear diagnostic markers. By demonstrating measurable injury to dopamine-releasing neurons, the study offers objective evidence that persistent neurological symptoms have a biological basis.

Building on these results, the investigators plan to launch a clinical trial in collaboration with University Health Network to evaluate whether therapies that improve dopamine function can reduce fatigue, improve motivation, and enhance memory in people with long COVID. If successful, the trial could pave the way for one of the first mechanism-based treatment approaches for the condition.

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Symptom-Specific Factors Associated With Chronic Constipation in Older Adults: Cross-Sectional Survey of Patient-Reported Outcomes

Background: In older adults with chronic constipation, symptoms of defecation difficulty often persist despite improvements in bowel movement frequency. However, constipation-related symptoms have rarely been examined as independent outcomes. Objective: The objective of this study is to explore factors associated with constipation-related symptoms, less than 3 spontaneous bowel movements per week, straining during bowel movements, a sensation of incomplete evacuation, and a sensation of anorectal obstruction or blockage. Methods: A cross-sectional web-based survey was conducted to collect patient-reported data. Constipation-related symptoms were defined according to the Rome IV criteria. Each symptom was treated as a binary variable in the analyses. Multivariable logistic regression analyses were used to examine associations between stool characteristics and medication, treatment processes, and lifestyle-related factors. Stool characteristics were classified using the Bristol Stool Form Scale, with hard stools defined as types 1 and 2. Results: We enrolled 546 participants and investigated the following constipation symptoms: less than 3 spontaneous bowel movements per week (n=226, 41.4%), straining (n=330, 60.4%), sensation of incomplete evacuation (n=344, 63.0%), and sensation of anorectal obstruction or blockage (n=242, 44.3%). Multivariable logistic regression analyses for these outcome variables showed that hard stool was consistently and independently associated with all constipation-related symptoms (odds ratio [OR] 1.86‐4.66). Symptom-specific associations that remained significant after false discovery rate adjustment included lower physical activity with less than 3 spontaneous bowel movements per week (OR 0.86, 95% CI 0.77‐0.96), stimulant laxative use with the sensation of incomplete evacuation (OR 2.01, 95% CI 1.22‐3.31), and lower adherence to the prescribed dosage with the sensation of anorectal obstruction or blockage (OR 0.87, 95% CI 0.78‐0.97). In contrast, the experience of adverse effects was associated with a higher probability of less than 3 spontaneous bowel movements per week and the sensation of anorectal obstruction or blockage. Conclusions: In older adults with chronic constipation, different constipation-related symptoms showed distinct patterns of association, while hard stool consistency emerged as a common factor across symptoms. These exploratory findings may support symptom-oriented assessment and help inform individualized management approaches using electronically collected patient-reported outcomes.
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Digital Mental Health Research Priorities, Revisited for the AI and Large Language Model Era

Digital mental health has become an established part of mental health care, but the rapid arrival of large language models and other artificial intelligence tools has refocused attention on the evidence needed to guide the field. This editorial updates the research priorities articulated by JMIR Mental Health in 2023, while reaffirming their emphasis on equity, replicability, privacy, efficacy, and engagement. What has changed is not the importance of these priorities, but the urgency with which they must now be applied. As digital tools become more clinically consequential, research must move beyond demonstrating that a technology is feasible, usable, or novel. The field needs studies that clarify how these tools work, for whom they are beneficial, under what conditions they may cause harm, and how they can be responsibly integrated into care. We call for research that is transparent about the technologies being studied, grounded in meaningful clinical questions, attentive to safety and accountability, and designed to produce knowledge that remains useful as specific products and models change. The promise of digital mental health will depend less on the sophistication of emerging tools than on the quality of the evidence used to shape their role in care.
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Maintaining Emotional Boundaries as a Parent

Parents often emphasize to children the importance of respecting others’ boundaries — don’t tickle another kid if they say they don’t like it, for example. Don’t kiss someone unless they welcome it. But within the family, we can fail to notice our own difficulty setting and respecting boundaries with our children, especially emotional boundaries.

What are emotional boundaries

Emotional boundaries refer to an individual’s sense of autonomy and ability to control how they think, feel, and engage with others. Those boundaries are crossed either when you try to control someone else’s thoughts or feelings or they try to control yours.   

Difficulty setting your own and respecting others’ emotional boundaries often comes from a place of care and concern. Parents are usually concerned that their child is not going to make safe choices or are trying to protect their child from distressing emotions. But the intrusion can have a negative impact on children’s emotional development as well as parents’ mental health, especially when it’s done repeatedly. Everyone has boundaries, even parents, and it’s important for kids to learn that.  

How parents overstep their child’s emotional boundaries

Parents can inadvertently encroach on their child’s right to their own thoughts and feelings through:

  • Over-involvement in children’s academic and social life: Your child has a whole life outside the home, and it can be anxiety-provoking to trust them to manage their homework, advocate for themselves with teachers, and navigate conflicts with peers. It can alleviate your anxiety to get involved, but that can feel highly intrusive to your child. For example, if your kid feels snubbed by a friend, you might feel the urge to contact that friend’s parent to try to smooth things over. However, over-involvement in these tasks can prevent your kid from developing the skills they need to manage challenging situations successfully and can impact their confidence in their ability to cope independently.
  • Overconcern to protect your child’s safety: Fears that something negative will happen to your child are understandable, but aggressive monitoring can backfire. This can include strict control over the ingredients in your teen’s food, the information they consume online, or what activities they do. This may temporarily alleviate anxiety about the child’s health and safety but it can lead to resentment and rebellion. 
  • Ignoring or rejecting children’s requests for privacy: It is normal for children and adolescents to want more privacy as they mature, from showering alone to keeping a private diary.Unless your child engages in an activity that suggests they are being unsafe, it is important to trust your child and let them decide what to share with you.
  • Sharing private information without the child’s permission: Parents telling anecdotes about their children, much to their kids’ embarrassment, is hardly new. However, that sharing now includes photographs and videos posted on social media that is broadcast far beyond close friends.It is important to include your child in decisions about what information is shared with others (excluding, of course, medical professionals). When in doubt, consider what information you would feel comfortable with them sharing about you.
  • Telling children what is or isn’t acceptable to value, think, or feel: Many parents, in an effort to help their child feel better, say things like, “Don’t worry about that” or “You can’t think that way.” These seemingly innocuous phrases can come across as attempts to control how the child feels. We can forget that kids are real people just like adults. And if they’re mad or upset about something, they want to be able to feel those feelings, not be told that that their feelings are wrong.

How parents fail to set their own emotional boundaries

Letting kids change your own values, thoughts, and feelings can also be unhealthy. Here are some common ways in which parents fail to set their own boundaries:

  • Allowing your child’s thoughts and feelings to influence your own too much:  Your child may act like it will be the end of the world if they don’t get into the right college. If their anxiety becomes your anxiety, then it’s going to be very hard for you to encourage your kid to have fun on the weekend or to go to bed with work left undone. What they need you to do is validate their feelings but challenge those worry thoughts and help them to relax.
  • Implying that your child is responsible for how you feel:  As a parent, your child’s well-being is your priority, and your emotional state is affected by your child’s behavior. But phrases like, “You are making me crazy” or “I cannot cope with one more word from you” unintentionally suggest that the child has control over your feelings. It’s not healthy for children to feel that they are responsible for your well-being.
  • Depending on your child for emotional support: If you’re a parent under stress and you’re not getting support elsewhere, it makes sense that you’re going to vent to a child. It’s not necessarily meant to burden a kid with financial stressors or relationship drama, and the child might be a sympathetic ear. But it blurs the boundaries between the parent role and the kid role, and that often causes difficulties for the kid in accepting parental authority in other domains. If they see themselves as equals in terms of emotional support, then they might think, why can you tell me what to do?
  • Sharing age-inappropriate information: Many children want to be treated as older than they are (at least in certain ways). So they might requestinformation about finances, romantic relationships, or family stressors that are inappropriate for their age. Although it can be tempting to share, it is not helpful long-term. It may alleviate the child’s current anxiety (and stop the nagging), but it will impair their ability to respect boundaries as well as interfere with them just being a kid.
  • Difficulty saying no: If you’re exhausted, the last thing you want is an argument. One way to avoid an argument is to say yes to your kid’s requests to buy a toy, stay up 15 more minutes, or have a different dinner. If you have boundaries around what you will spend, how much sleep you need, or what you will cook, you are still a good parent. Sticking to your limits teaches your child to accept other people’s boundaries without whining or threats. 
  • Allowing your child to treat you unkindly: Many parents allow their children to treat them in ways they would never tolerate from another person. This includes calling the parent mean or profane names, hitting them, or disregarding their needs (for money, sleep, leisure time, etc.).  Allowing this kind of behavior prevents the child from learning how to respect boundaries and tolerate the emotions they experience when they face them.

Factors that contribute to boundary concerns

There are specific circumstances that can make it difficult for a parent to know where the appropriate boundaries are. They include a child’s late development, psychiatric challenges, and history of unsafe choices. For example, a child may have delays in language, executive functioning, or social or emotional skills. These things can make it challenging to determine how involved you need to be in your child’s daily life and how much independence they can handle.

  • Poor risk assessment and impulsivity: Many disorders can impact children’s ability to think clearly, regulate emotionally, and act safely. For example, a teen experiencing a manic episode may overestimate their abilities, underestimate risk, and act impulsively. Or a child with ADHD might hard to control on crowded city streets or in restaurants, so you avoid taking them out or letting them do activities on their own with friends.  
  • Lack of confidence: Anxious children may underestimate their abilities and request continued support past when they are capable of independence. For example, a socially anxious child may ask their parent to order for them at a restaurant or keep track of their homework assignments.  When a parent accommodates these requests, it confirms their belief that they still need help.
  • Executive functioning deficits: Children who struggle with executive functioning may need more scaffolding to complete daily self-care tasks than other kids their age. This can look like parents providing frequent reminders of assignments, events, or even hygiene tasks — as well as cleaning their room for them long past when an child with ADHD should be doing it themselves. Consider how you can scaffold the skills (packing their bookbag!) without doing tasks for them, and gradually remove the supports over time.
  • History of not successfully navigating tasks: A child’s history of poorly handling a responsibility (safe use of technology, completion of homework, brushing their teeth) often reduces parents’ confidence in the child’s abilities and increases their inclination to step in. Although extra supervision and support may be needed initially, it is important to reassess your child’s abilities over time as they can learn and grow if you let them!

How to get better at boundaries

Once you have recognized the challenges in respecting your child’s boundaries and protecting your own, the next step is to figure out what those boundaries are.

  • Identify your boundaries: What things are most important to support your child’s growing independence and sense of autonomy? What boundaries do you need to set to protect your own mental health? Consider what level of involvement you want to have in their academics, friendships, emotion regulation, and appearance and what you want to disclose to them about your own relationship, emotions, or work.  
  • Practice setting these boundaries: It is much easier to set a boundary when you are not forced to make the choice with a child’s puppy dog eyes looking at you. Rehearsing how you will say no, decline to share certain information, or respond to an anxiety-provoking situation can prepare you to respond more effectively and in line with your values in a moment of conflict.
  • Share your reasons for boundaries: Children can be quick to interpret lack of boundaries as “more caring,” but being consistent in language around why boundaries are being set can help prevent this. When setting a boundary, it is helpful to couch it in care. For example, “I care about you enjoying your childhood, so I do not feel comfortable sharing with you about our family’s finances.”

When kids want more independence than you are sure they are ready to handle, identifying steps toward their goal can be effective. Giving them opportunities to show maturity, with success at one step leading to more responsibility, can help you trust your child with greater independence. What can your kids show you that will help you feel confident in their ability to manage their emotions themselves or make well thought-out decisions?

Kids also need to recognize that they sometimes overestimate their own abilities, that there are times they have not assessed risk accurately and still need their parents. It is important to teach your child that you should be alerted if they are experiencing something that is unsafe or concerning (such as a friend talking about suicide or sharing an inappropriate photo). Discussions with your kid can sort out how to work toward new milestones and help everybody feel confident that they have the skills to do it.

Modeling a healthy respect for boundaries will set your child up to establish their own and respect others’ boundaries throughout their life.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are emotional boundaries between parents and children?

Emotional boundaries are the limits that protect each person’s right to their own thoughts, feelings, values, and decisions. In families, healthy boundaries allow children to develop independence while helping parents avoid taking responsibility for emotions or choices that belong to their child.

Why are emotional boundaries important in parenting?

Healthy emotional boundaries support children’s confidence, autonomy, and ability to solve problems on their own. They also protect parents’ well-being by preventing them from becoming overly responsible for their child’s feelings, worries, or decisions.

What are signs a parent is overstepping a child’s emotional boundaries?

Common signs include getting overly involved in a child’s friendships or school life, refusing age-appropriate privacy, sharing personal information without permission, or telling a child what they should think or feel. While these behaviors often come from a place of love and concern, they can undermine a child’s confidence and independence.

How can parents determine appropriate emotional boundaries?

Parents can start by considering where their child is developmentally and what level of support versus independence is appropriate. A good guideline is to provide enough structure to keep children safe while gradually giving them more responsibility and privacy as they demonstrate readiness.

The post Maintaining Emotional Boundaries as a Parent appeared first on Child Mind Institute.