I know a family of 7 ,I was fortunate to live among them.its been some 3 years now.3 boys 4 girls.
They all suffered from emotional abuse.
Their father ,a strict disciplinarian inculcated a character of fear instead of respect into them.
This fear became the emotional abuse in the lives of his children before his death.
The high-handedness was Soo much that every expression of these kids were suppressed .
Once their Dad sees them trying to express themselves progressive he starts to shout at them for being immature and not ripe for exposure to things.
Once this man gets angry,his children all bottle up.
The man would not communicate to his wife or children once upset.
He would just keep quiet with facial expression of anger.
They couldn't express their true feelings till there father suddenly died.
To make it worse the man has a very hard penchant for Argumentation and confrontations.
The ability to confront anyone became a hobby everyday ,the reports from these confrontations,the news surrounding the man and his family and the reprisals sort of created a kind of death to the true feelings of these children.
Almost everyday was spent living in horror and in fear.
To make things worse, their lives became their parents choices .
This meant they didn't have the chance to choose what to study in school.
Their parents were too harsh ,strict and very conservative .
This upbringing made them totally unable to communicate their feelings or expressions with people.
For 9 years of imprisoned expressions and feelings.
Living on eggshells has damaged their emotional competence and made them relate out of fear and panic to any stranger or visitor.
We see that there is also a grave level of mistrust because strangers or visitors whom the parents brought to these kids and trusted compounded their woes.
It baffles me that the whole family are intellectuals but despite these things their emotions have been damaged .
There is conflicts among their own extended family.
There are deep wounds that need to be healed and some forms of upbringing that needs to be corrected
The mother is a damaged and broken woman that has made her not to trust outsiders or be free with anyone.
She panics out of any new development instead of accepting it with appraisal.
The girl children among them have hidden their lives in a shell
It is as a result of these upbringing that they cannot relate properly with people they are suppose to communicate with effectively
In such cases,what can be done?
Would seeing a counselor or therapist or going to rehab solve there conservative moods?
Worse still once something is discovered wrong their last parent won't talk about it to anyone until it has attained another damaged dimension to their lives.
This family has suffered all forms of abuse.
From verbal ,to sexual ,to emotional,abuse.
What can be done

Their father is still alive in their heads.

They should seek out a therapist who is grounded in Systemic Family Therapy (SFT) and genogram interpretation but I guess being in Nigeria would not make it that easy to access and probably pay for it.