NUI Galway’s Centre for Pain Research is carrying out a new study on the everyday scrapes, bumps, and pains young kids endure, and how their parent’s reaction influences them.
The study will look at Minor Pain events experienced by kids every day, and how the way that their parents react might influence how a child learns about pain.
For this the research team are seeking the participation of parents with a young child between the ages of two and a half and six years old.
They are seeking to understand more about how parent and child affect each other, such as what parental responses might make the child’s experience easier, and which make it worse.
Grace O’Sullivan, Centre for Pain Research at NUIG and lead researcher of the study, said that previous research has show that children experience a painful incident every waking three hours.
“Parents often deal with multiple incidents each day, and this study may be of interest to parents who want to know a little more about how to assess their child’s pain experiences.”
As part of the study, parents will complete a five-minute online diary each evening for two weeks about a painful event their child experienced that day.
Additionally, parent and child will fill out a two-minute smartphone assessment together about how they felt during any events.
Professor Brian McGuire from the CPR added that what is exciting about this study is that it can show how parents and kids learn from each other about coping with painful events.
“Learning good pain coping skills in childhood probably protects us in adult life,” Professor McGuire explained.
More information about the study can be found online here or by emailing g.osullivan6@nuigalway.ie.
