Insecure attachment and its relationship with negative self perception in children with nocturnal enuresis.

BACKGROUND: Nocturnal Enuresis (NE) is considered as a multifactorial condition with a specific focus on psychological functioning regarding etiology. Various studies show that children with NE suffer from different types of self-esteem problems and insecure attachment styles. Nevertheless the relationship between these two psychological functions has not been adequately studied. OBJECTIVE: Main objective of the current study is to evaluate self-perception and attachment profiles of enuretic children in relation with various sociodemographic parameters. DESIGN: 41 children with nocturnal enuresis and 40 age and sex matched healthy controls were compared in means of attachment using Kern's Security Scale and self-perception using Self-Perception Profile for Children measures. RESULTS: Our results show that enuretic children suffer significantly more insecure attachment styles and negative self perception issues. Moreover enuretic children varied from healthy controls in means of number of siblings and birth rank. DISCUSSION: Current study suggests that enuretic children should be evaluated for possible psychological difficulties like insecure attachment and self-esteem issues and proper interventions in these areas should be considered. Lower self-esteem as a well-known phenomenon in enuresis research may be addressed in relation with insecure attachment. Nevertheless our study have certain limitation; the possible psychiatric comorbidities from both study groups were excluded only with anamneses. Further the male dominance of the gender of the participants can be seen as a limitation. CONCLUSION: The possible relationship between negative self perception and insecure attachment may serve as an important focus in means of etiology and interventions in NE.