ADVANCES ON MATERNAL AND PATERNAL MENTALIZING: NEW PERSPECTIVES OF RESEARCH AND INTERVENTION

Parental mentalizing – the capability to understand the underlying mental states of their own behavior and of their child – is considered crucial within parent–child relationship and child development. However, there is a lack of research examining how parental mentalization is related to the development of different psychological vulnerabilities in children at specific life stages, such as in preadolescents and early adolescents. Besides, even if the role of mothers in this process has been widely studied, the empirical understanding of the specific contribution of fathers is still in its early stages. Following this direction, improving maternal and paternal mentalizing across evidence-based interventions may be particularly important to support the parent–child relationship, enhanc the parent's ability to keep the child in mind, and promote the child’s adaptive development. Therefore, this panel aims to present several Italian contributions that illustrate the key role of maternal and paternal mentalizing across different contexts. The University of Milano-Bicocca's contribution investigates young fathers' mentalization capability and paternal interaction styles of infants at three months. The study from the University of Urbino explores the relationship between father-child relationship quality and specific characteristics of epistemic trust and mentalization in a sample of young adults. The study from the University of Rome and University of Perugia presents preliminary data on the relationship between maternal mentalizing and attachment with child’s externalizing behavior during early adolescence. The contribution from the University of Genoa presents a pilot study following an online attachment-based intervention for parents of preadolescents with behavioral disorders focusing on mentalizing and emotion regulation in parenthood.