Read an Insight Report on early years and supporting better outcomes for young children, from across five A Better Start partnerships around the UK.
Parental mental health and wellbeing
Evidence shows that children’s experiences in their early years can have a lasting impact. Strong protective factors such as relationships, high-quality service support and positive home and community environments can build resilience and improve outcomes for a child throughout their life course.
Mental ill-health is recognised as a major public health challenge. Parental mental health and wellbeing play a key role in shaping children’s development, health and future life chances. Evidence shows that many children grow up in households where parents are experiencing emotional distress, and that this can affect their mental health, learning and attendance at school.
Families often experience multiple, overlapping challenges such as poverty, housing insecurity, isolation or domestic abuse, creating a cycle which can both contribute to, and result from, poor mental health. Breaking these cycles is difficult without the right support in place.
What families have said
Parents reported that barriers such as stigma, fear of judgment and lack of awareness of available support can prevent them from seeking help. Many say they would benefit from practical, non-judgemental support with parenting, as well as services that recognise the needs of the whole family.
There is a growing understanding that support should not focus on individuals in isolation. Instead, it should consider parents, children and wider family relationships together, helping children to understand and respond to family experiences, while supporting parents to build confidence and skills.
Rather than viewing parents as clients or service users, they were regarded as partners who had power and control over how much or how little they engaged with services, without penalty, unlike a clinical service.
A Better Start: Parents as Partners report, p.10
What works in practice
Learning from A Better Start (ABS) partnerships shows the value of working with families, not just for them. The report contains case studies demonstrating what works, including the following.
- Working in partnership with parents: seeing parents as active partners with choice, control and agency over how they engage with support, without fear of judgement or ‘penalty’ for non-engagement.
- Building trusted, supportive relationships: prioritising warm relationships and using strengths-based language that validates parents’ experiences and feelings.
- Taking a whole-family, holistic approach: recognising the family as one unit with interconnected needs, and tailoring support to their wider context including cultural, socio-economic and community factors.
- Offering flexible, community-based support: providing accessible support (e.g. home or community settings) for however long is needed, and incorporating peer support to reduce isolation and strengthen networks.
Explore the evidence and case studies in more detail.