Even in the chaos of war, parents can be a shield. A new study finds that parental emotional support helps protect children from anxiety and distress—even when parents themselves suffer from trauma. By encouraging open conversations and validating emotions, parents create a safe space that strengthens children’s resilience in the face of conflict.
A new study conducted by
Dr. Mor Kleynikov and
Prof. Dana Lassri from the Hebrew University,
Prof. Noga Cohen, and
Dr. Joy Benatov from the University of Haifa, together with
Prof. Reuma Gadassi-Polack from Bar-Ilan University and Yale University, reveals that the way parents help their children regulate emotions, such as encouraging conversations about feelings, legitimizing emotional expression, finding solutions, or promoting distraction, can protect children from the negative effects of war, even when the parents themselves experience post-traumatic symptoms.
The data were collected about a month after the
October 7, 2023 terrorist attack during the Israel–Hamas war and included
318 parents of children aged
5–18 (76% women; average age: 40) in Israel. Most participants reported significant exposure to the war:
- 32% reported a rocket landing in their area
- 28% lost a relative
- 16% were partners of reservists
- 6% experienced an immediate threat to their lives
Key Findings
- 28% of parents met the clinical diagnostic threshold for PTSD.
- The more severe the parents’ PTSD symptoms, the more likely their children were to experience emotional and behavioral difficulties such as anxiety, aggression, sleep problems, and psychosomatic symptoms.
- Interpersonal Emotion Regulation (IER)—the way parents help their children manage emotions—significantly reduced the strength of this connection. Even among parents with high levels of PTSD symptoms, children of parents who used adaptive emotion regulation strategies reported fewer difficulties.
- Results showed that while there was a strong link between parental PTSD symptoms and children’s emotional and behavioral problems at low levels of parental IER, this link was much weaker when parents employed high levels of interpersonal emotion regulation.
Parents are central to their children’s resilience. The study found that even when they themselves are traumatized, they can still serve as an emotional resource for their children. The more parents encouraged open emotional dialogue, legitimized negative emotions, and helped find solutions, the more resilient their children were.
The novelty of this study lies in its optimistic message:
the positive connection between supportive parenting and children’s well-being persists even when parents themselves are traumatized. You don’t need to be a “perfect parent” to protect your child—what matters most is the parent’s ability to listen and give space to feelings.
“The study shows that there is something we can do, even under harsh conditions,” the researchers explain. “It is possible to provide parents with practical tools to support their children emotionally, and thereby prevent psychological decline in an entire generation.”
The study highlights how family relationships can serve as a powerful protective factor. Even in situations of severe external threat, the emotional bond between parent and child can become a safe space that allows the child to cope with an impossible reality.
The findings emphasize the importance of investing in
trauma-informed parenting programs—accessible, evidence-based tools that can make a real difference in children’s well-being, not only during war but also in times of ongoing stress.
The researchers recommend integrating the study’s findings into
educational and therapeutic programs for parents living in conflict zones as part of a trauma-informed approach. Incorporating adaptive interpersonal emotion regulation techniques can provide everyday emotional support and reduce the long-term effects of trauma on children.