The African Journal of Primary Health & Family Medicine welcomes submissions that encourage scholarly exchange between family medicine and primary health care researchers and practitioners across Africa and the developing world, whilst providing a contextual and holistic view of family medicine as practiced across the continent.

It is well-documented that poor parenting practices result in negative emotional outcomes in children. Specifically, this review seeks to explore the relationship between parenting practices and internalization symptomology. This study utilized a systematic review and an appraisal tool was developed in order to ensure that included articles maintained high methodological rigour. Biomed Central, PsychArticles, Academic Search Complete, Eric, Sage and SocIndex databases were searched. After yielding 1002 articles in the initial search strategy, 39 articles were appraised and a total of 21 empirical studies were used for data extraction. In all, 13 articles indicated that some forms of poor parenting practices are related to internalizing behaviours. For example, over-involved parenting, spanking endorsement, over-reactive parenting, insecurely attached children, authoritarian parenting and permissive parenting are all linked to internalizing behaviours in children. Two articles reported a negative relationship between authoritative parenting and internalizing symptoms. This systematic review does indicate a relationship between parent–child relations and internalizing symptoms in children. In several studies, the complexities of this relationship remain unknown, and warrant further attention.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) and its multiple effects are well documented in Western research, but these are not adequately described in Africa. The effects of IPV on adolescent health and well-being are not conclusive. The aim of this review was to systematically appraise prevalence studies conducted on the African continent to establish the prevalence of IPV and the implications of exposure on adolescents in Africa. A comprehensive search was conducted in May 2012 for the previous 10 years, using databases such as Ebscohost (Medline, CINAHL, PsyArticles), Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Project Muse and BioMed Central and also specific journals Lancet, and JSTOR. Two reviewers independently evaluated the methodological quality of the studies reviewed. Seven eligible epidemiological studies were included in this review. Five of the studies were conducted in South Africa, one in Liberia, and another was a multi-country study that included Egypt, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda and Zambia. The prevalence of IPV in African countries ranged from approximately 26.5% to 48%. All studies reported exposure to family violence during childhood. The findings support the global burden of IPV. There is also a need for standardized tools to determine IPV in Africa and a clear definition that can be used in research to allow comparison with future IPV studies. In addition, the studies point to a need for interventions focusing on adolescents exposed to family violence.

After the unprecedented changes experienced in higher education due to the Covid-19 pandemic, there is a need to integrate initial thoughts and reflective experience to decide on the way forward. This study aimed to reflect on, and make sense of the events related to South African higher education institutions HEIs at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic by using the Cynefin framework. Data from a rapid review of online media at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic and a collaborative autoethnography session 1 year since lockdowns were implemented are used to present perspectives for the sense-making process. This offers insights to both ends of the spectrum as it highlights the evolution of processes taking place at multiple levels from government policies to institutional practices, as well as how this impacted on both staff and students. The Cynefin framework demonstrated sense-making efforts in the disordered, to the chaotic, to the complex, then to the complicated and eventually to the simple domain. Each domain ushered in its peculiarities and highlighted the issues ranging from vulnerabilities experienced in the higher education sector, to trying to reconfigure the academic year, to dealing with wicked problems, to eventually relying on expert assistance to navigate the virtual university space. Trying to establish causality in the simple domain proved challenging as the information available during the time was sparse. Despite these challenges, the lessons learnt include the importance of the sense-making process among all academic staff, the significance of collaboration and team efforts and the need to adapt leadership and self-leadership approaches to the changed ways of working in higher education institutions.

Early childhood development (ECD) has been recognised to be the most important contributor to long-term social and emotional development. Therefore, positive parenting is paramount to foster quality parent–child interaction. Previous research shows that for parents to adopt a positive parenting style, some degree of parental knowledge is required. The aim of this study was to compare the relationship between knowledge of child development and parenting styles in low and high socio-economic groups of parents in ECD centres. A cross-sectional study was conducted using a correlation-comparative research design. The sample consisted of N = 140 parents with children between two and five years old from low and high socio-economic groups. Descriptive statistics and Pearson correlation were used to analyse the data. The findings also show that there is no correlation between knowledge of child development and authoritative parenting styles. However, correlations do exist between the other variables.

Aim: The aim of the systematic study was to determine the effect of parenting practices on adolescent risk behaviours such as substance use and sexual risk behaviour. Method: Quantitative research studies were systematically collected from various databases such as Academic Search Complete, MEDLINE (Pubmed), JSTOR, Project Muse and SAGE for the duration of 2003-2013 which was within the 10 year period of relevant literature to the date of study. Results: Findings established that parental monitoring and communication prevented drug initiation, delayed alcohol initiation, and sexual debut, increased alcohol refusal efficacy, and decreased delinquent behaviour and risk taking behaviours in high risk adolescents. Conclusion: This review shows that parental practices play significant protective and promotive roles in managing adolescent risk behaviours.