Early Child Parent Separation and Risk for Childhood Psychopathology*

Prolonged separation from parents has been shown to be significantly related to psychiatric morbidity in children. The relative role of mother and father in the socio-emotional development of the child has been variously contested. A controlled retrospective study on children with well defined hysterical, emotional and conduct disorder was done for experiences of separation from parents between 6 months and 5 years of age. Relative risk estimation showed that there is a significantly increased risk for psychopathology in children who experienced prolonged separations of more than 3 months duration from either father, or both parents together or have multiple such separations. This risk is more in boys than girls. Surrogate care did not seem to be protective in prolonged separation and no single cause for separation emerged as significantly related to increased risk. The relevance of this finding is discussed in the context of the Indian family situation.