Floods and mental health
We were already following these families before the 2024 floods. Now we study how the disaster entered their mental health trajectories, family relationships and children's development.
A disaster does not start from zero
A disaster happens at one moment, but its effects enter stories that began earlier.
Since 2019, the Rio Grande Cohort has followed the mental health, family relationships and development of mothers and children. This makes it possible to study the 2024 floods not just as an isolated event, but as part of trajectories already observed over the years.
What we want to understand
Maternal mental health
How different levels of exposure to the floods relate to trajectories of depression, anxiety and stress.
Child mental health
How the experience of the floods and family mental health relate to children's behaviour and well-being.
Parenting and family relationships
How parenting practices, family adjustment and mother–child relationships may change in contexts of greater adversity.
Inequalities and social resources
How income, education, social networks and other social conditions can shape the way families go through the disaster.
Not all families were affected in the same way
To understand the effects of the floods, it is not enough to divide families into "affected" and "not affected". We study the different ways in which the disaster entered everyday life.
Territory
Where the family lived and how the location of their home related to the areas hit by the floods.
Displacement
Whether the family had to leave home, for how long and where they stayed during that period.
Losses
Damage to the home, difficulties returning home and material losses associated with the flood.
What time allows us to see
The 2019 Rio Grande Cohort lets us compare the current situation of the same families with what we already knew about them — before the disaster.
Mothers have been followed repeatedly at different points in their children's childhood. This makes it possible to study mental health and family relationships before and after events that transformed everyday life, such as the pandemic and the floods.
The new follow-up extends this story by observing maternal mental health, child mental health and parenting again in the period after the floods.
Explore the 2019 Rio Grande Cohort →A look at everyday interactions
In addition to questionnaires, the proposal includes a substudy to observe interactions between mothers and children in everyday situations.
Audiovisual recordings may help explore whether experiences such as displacement and greater exposure to the floods relate to forms of interaction and parenting practices between mothers and children.
The idea is to bring what families report closer to what happens in everyday interactions.
Explore our first-person vision & AI →What this study can add
Understanding who was affected and how
Going beyond "affected" and "not affected" to understand how territory, displacement and losses combine in families' experiences.
Recognising trajectories of greater vulnerability
Studying how prior conditions and experiences during the disaster relate to families' health and recovery over time.
Helping prepare future responses
Producing evidence that can contribute to research, care and planning in the face of future climate disasters.
Opportunities to collaborate
The project is open to dialogue with researchers and institutions interested in mental health, the life course, disaster epidemiology, climate change, parenting and child health.
Propose a collaboration