Parents must try to be calm

EMMA CITRON, is a consultant clinical psychologist who specialises in trauma in children.

She said: “There has always been trauma in children’s lives but it appears now we are getting more and more of these heinous acts of terror.

“An interesting theme is how normalised we have become because of the bombardment we get in the media.

“I say bombardment because you need to think about the difference in the reach of coverage of say an IRA attack in the 1980s to the Paris attacks in 2015.

“Everything now is so much more vivid and instant.

“But are young people more immune to it? No.

“With these terror attacks, we are almost never personally touched by them.

“But it is often very hard for people, particularly children, to really relate to what is going on, other than to say it is terrible for those affected.

“Some children are much more prone to worrying about these things, so it can impact some people a lot more than others.

“But parents know their children best and I think it is important for them to tailor what they say to them about the situations, as this will have more impact.

“You can’t live in a bubble, children do need information and they do need to know how to relate to the world around them.

“We must not bring up a generation of scared or anxious young people because we are not doing them any favours.

“The parents themselves are a big factor here, despite all this information being available, they are a huge influence on how children view the world.

“Their behaviour and views have a huge impact.

“If they are saying things like ‘of course we can’t take the Tube because there might be a terrorist attack’ then it will have a huge impact on a child.

“Parents need to keep their own worries and thoughts to themselves, explain things coolly and calmly and give them the right information.”