Ninoslava Pećnik was born in 1965 in Zagreb. She graduated from the Department of Psychology of the Faculty of Philosophy in Zagreb in 1990 by defending a thesis on “Violence in romantic relationships between young men and women and attitudes towards physical abuse of women”. She gained a master’s degree in 1993 with work on ​​assessing risk of child abuse, and a doctorate in 2001 by defending a dissertation on “Intergenerational transmission of physical child abuse’.

She was elected to the position of assistant professor in the field of social activities, and to the position of extraordinary and regular professor in the field of psychology (branch of social and developmental psychology). She is head of the Department of Psychology of the Social Work Study Center of the Faculty of Law in Zagreb. She is the holder of the undergraduate courses ‘Social Psychology’ and ‘Child Abuse and Neglect’ and co-holder of the graduate course ‘Family Policy, Parenting, and Children’. She teaches the elective course ‘Social Psychology’ for law students. At the doctoral study of social work and social policy, she is the co-holder of the course ‘Contemporary Research of Social Work’, while at specialist studies she teaches the courses ‘Contemporary  Parenting’, ‘Contemporary Parenting and Children’s Rights’ and ‘Parenting and Divorce’. Under her mentorship, five doctoral dissertations, over 20 master’s and specialist theses, and over 80 graduate theses were defended.

She was the leader of two scientific research projects: ‘Parenting and parenting support services in the community’ (2011-2013), which was carried out with the support of UNICEF Croatia with the participation of 1,600 parents of preschool children throughout Croatia, and ‘Characteristics of the family in the Republic of Croatia and attitudes towards child upbringing’ (2009-2011), which was implemented with the support of the Ministry of Family, Veterans and Intergenerational Solidarity with the participation of 1,200 thirteen-year-olds and their mothers and fathers. She was the co-leader of the international research project “Social work with children at risk in Croatia and Sweden”, (2005-2006). As a researcher, she participated in several scientific research projects (Children, youth, family and social development in Croatia; Action and evaluation research in social work, Single-parent families: Personal experience and attitudes of social environment'(2001-2003).

Up to now, she has published, independently or in co-authorship, 12 author books and three editorials, as well as over 70 scientific and professional articles and book chapters.

As a guest lecturer, she held lectures for doctoral and undergraduate programs at universities in Amsterdam, Seville, Orebro, Galway, Oxford and others, as well as postgraduate studies at the Faculty of Philosophy in Zagreb and Rijeka, at the Faculty of Education and Rehabilitation. She participated in various committees for the defense of doctorates, including at Malmö University.

She is the co-founder of the European Family Support Network EurofamNet and the co-leader of the Working Group for Quality Standards and Evidence-Based Family Support Programs, within COST18123 (2018-2023).

As vice-president of the Working Group for Parental Skills, especially for the Prevention of Violence Against Children at the Committee for Social Cohesion of the Council of Europe (2005-2006), she co-created the concept of positive parenting (Pećnik, 2007) and was a consultant for the development of Recommendation 19 (2006) on positive parenting support policy.

She is the co-author of the “Growing Up Together” support program for parents of the youngest children (Pećnik and Starc, 2010), which was developed in 2009 with the support of UNICEF Office for Croatia, and today is implemented not only throughout Croatia but also in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria and Poland. She is the President of the Board of Directors of the Center for Parenting Support “Growing Up Together”, an NGO that develops evidence-based universal and targeted parenting and family support programs.

In 2011, she received the Annual Award for the Promotion of Children’s Rights from the Government of the Republic of Croatia and the “Parents in Action” Association award for her contribution in the field of supporting responsible parenting.

She was a UNICEF consultant for Croatia and manager of scientific research projects and projects aimed at the development of services in the field of early child development, parenting and child protection, including the projects “The first three are the most important” (2007 – 2010), “Parenting and parenting support services in the community’ (2011-2013), “For a stronger family” (2017-2021) and “Phase III: Testing the EU Child Guarantee for every child in Croatia” (2021-2023).

She participated in the launch of several civic social initiatives active in the areas of providing assistance to victims of violence (SOS telephone for women victims of violence, Autonomous Women’s House), the Association “Suncokret” for volunteer assistance to exiles and refugees, of which she was the first president (1991-1996).