Developmental perspectives in child and adolescent depressive symptoms in a community sample.

This developmental study provides some normative data on the distribution of depressive symptoms in 210 children and adolescents in three different age groups (8, 12, and 17 years) from a nonclinically referred sample. The Child Assessment Schedule and other instruments were used. Studying depression from a dimensional point of view, the authors found withdrawal, pessimism, horrible dreams, and suicidal ideation and tendency in the different age groups to be closely related to depressive symptoms.

Psychiatric disorders in a community sample of adolescents.

The prevalence of psychiatric disorders diagnosed according to DSM-III in adolescents in the general population is not known. The authors address this issue in a community sample of 150 adolescents 14-16 years of age. Structured interviews as well as other instruments were used to collect data. Twenty-eight (18.7%) of the 150 adolescents were identified as having a psychiatric disorder. These 28 adolescents viewed their parents as less caring, had lower self-esteem, and resolved their conflicts through verbal aggression and physical violence more often than did the adolescents who did not have a psychiatric disorder. The authors make recommendations regarding the use of structured interviews in future research.

Depression, depressive symptoms, and depressed mood among a community sample of adolescents.

Using a structured interview, the authors found that the prevalence of major depression and dysthymic disorder was 4.7% and 3.3%, respectively, in a community sample of 150 adolescents. All of the adolescents who met the criteria for major depression and dysthymic disorder had other psychiatric disorders as well; anxiety was the most frequent accompanying DSM-III diagnosis.

Psychopathology in a community sample of children and adolescents: a developmental perspective.

Psychiatric disorders, symptom clusters and adjustment problems in a community based sample comprised three age cohorts: 8, 12, and 17 years. The data indicated that anxiety symptoms decreased with age. Conduct problems increased with age for males, affective problems increased with age for females, and substance use and social anxiety increased with age for both sexes. Concerns about inadequacy also increases with age, but only for females. These gender-based developmental differences in psychopathology and other findings are discussed.

Levels of hopelessness in children and adolescents: a developmental perspective.

We investigated hopelessness at 3 age levels (8-, 12-, and 17-year-olds) in 210 children and adolescents from a community sample derived from public school listings of 4,810 children in a midwestern college town. The sample included 105 boys and 105 girls, and there were 70 subjects in each age group. The major finding was that children with high hopelessness scores are at greater risk not only for suicide and depression as revealed by the Child Assessment Schedule and the Birleson Depression Scale but also for overall psychopathology. This study suggests that hopelessness does not increase from preadolescence to adolescence in a general population.

Correlates of psychopathology in adolescents.

The authors examined the relationship among measures of self-perception and the family environment for both general psychopathology and diagnostic clusters. The subject pool was a community sample of adolescents. The findings emphasize the relationship of the home environment to the presence of general psychopathology and specific diagnoses.

Parental bonding and depressive disorders in adolescents.

The present exploratory study was designed to determine whether a sample of depressed adolescents differed from demographically similar samples of normal and non-depressed psychiatric controls as a function of their perceived patterns of parental bonding. All research participants were recruited from the general population. Diagnoses were based on a structured diagnostic interview keyed to DSM-III criteria. Parental bonding was assessed using the Parental Bonding Instrument [PBI; Parker, G. Tupling, H. & Brown, L.B. (1979). A parental bonding instrument. British Journal of Medical Psychology, 52, 1-10]. The results of this study suggest that parental bonding plays an important but non-specific role in the occurrence of adolescent psychopathology.

Conduct disordered adolescents from a community sample.

This study reports on a group of adolescents with conduct disorder in a community sample. Utilizing structured interviews for the adolescents and their parents, and strict requirements for caseness, conduct disorder was found to be the most common psychiatric problem (along with anxiety disorders). Various instruments were used. The findings, including approaches to conflict resolution in adolescents and their parents, are discussed.