The family constitutes a crucial social context for the development of children and adolescents. The aim of this study was to explore the associations between a child's or adolescent's gender and age, the functionality of their family system, and selected additional family factors (socioeconomic status, family structure, history of abuse, and parental mental health) with psychosocial functioning difficulties. The study included 198 children and adolescents (108 boys and 90 girls) aged between 5 and 19 years, who, at the time of the study, were admitted to clinical psychological or psychiatric treatment at the Counseling Center for Children, Adolescents, and Parents in Ljubljana. For the purposes of this research, I translated and employed the Family Assessment Device in Slovene language to evaluate family functioning, and employed the Child Behavior Checklist for Ages 6 to 18 to assess psychosocial difficulties. Demographic data were collected from the intake forms at the Counseling Center. The findings indicate that family-related factors significantly contribute to psychosocial difficulties among children and adolescents. Different family factors were found to contribute variably to specific types of difficulties. Significant differences in family factors were also observed between children and adolescents with varying degrees of psychosocial difficulties and those with differing numbers of difficulties. Based on the results of this study, it appears advisable that a substantial part of interventions addressing psychosocial difficulties in children and adolescents should also be dedicated to working with their families.
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