Brief introduction:

Parents with young children are keen to be good parents. Many invest time and money to learn to be quality parents. Given the busy schedule and tight budget of most parents, it will be strategic to know how to pick quality programs. The talk will highlight some key criteria for quality parent education programs and cite examples on some locally-developed evidence-based parent education programs for illustration. Parents and professionals who work with children and their caregivers will benefit from learning about such programs and choose wisely.

About the Speaker:

Dr Sandra Tsang Kit Man, JP, is an Associate Professor of the Department of Social Work and Social Administration of The University of Hong Kong. She is a Registered Clinical Psychologist, a Fellow of the Hong Kong Psychological Society, and a Registered Social Worker. Her research, publications and media profile focus on parent education, children with special educational needs, children and youth development and drug prevention. She was awarded the HKU Teaching Fellowship for outstanding teaching, the Chief Executive's Commendation for Community Services, and the 2011 Medal of the Hong Kong Paediatrics Society for contributions in Child Health. She is a current member of the Social Welfare Advisory Committee, the Equal Opportunities Commission, Community Chest, the Public Libraries Advisory Committee, and the Barrister Disciplinary Tribunal Panel.

Brief introduction:

Research found that autocratic parenting was related to child anxiety and depression, while positive parenting was associated with harmonious parent-child relationship and children's healthy functioning. Positive parenting includes building children's positive emotions, promoting children's harmonious relationships with others, enhancing their sense of achievement and engagement, as well as guiding them to identify their meaning in life. Positive parenting also helps to nurture and cultivate children's character strengths to live a flourishing life. Research found that character strengths such as gratitude, hope, optimism, love, forgiveness, and altruism could help children combat against negative environments and life challenges.

About the Speaker:

Dr Sylvia Kwok is the Associate Professor teaching Social Work in the Department of Applied Social Sciences at the City University of Hong Kong. Her mission is to improve the mental health of children, adolescents and their parents. Her research mainly focuses on the family ecological and positive psychological factors that are related to anxiety, depression, and suicide of children and adolescents. She has published a number of papers related to child and adolescent mental health, parenting and positive psychology in international refereed journals with high impact factor. She was also invited to give presentations in a number of conferences and symposiums, including the Harvard School of Public Health. Integrating positive psychology concepts with cognitive-behavioral therapy, Dr Kwok has implemented a number of positive psychology projects to alleviate anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation, as well as to improve the well-being of children, adolescents and parents. The projects include: "Enhancing hope and gratitude to alleviate depression in primary school students", "Promoting gratitude to lessen depression in secondary school students", "Developing hope and optimism to decrease anxiety in secondary school students", "Application of positive psychology for whole person development of pre-school children".