Symptoms of anxiety and depression within primary school pupils

Mičević, Marina. (2007). Symptoms of anxiety and depression within primary school pupils. Diploma Thesis. Filozofski fakultet u Zagrebu, Department of Psychology. [mentor Jokić-Begić, Nataša].

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Abstract

Anxiety and depression are very frequent in childhood. And while some behaviour will disappear during childhood development, other will exceed to pathology. The goal of the research we have conducted was to determine differences in anxiety and depression intensity within the group of girls and boys in higher grades of primary school. Also, we wanted to determine differences in types and frequencies of anxiety and depression symptoms of the same group. The group was composed of 463 pupils of higher grades in primary school. We used SKAN (Childhood anxiety scale) and CDI (Childhood depression inventory) in our research. Results show that girls have higher intensity of anxiety than boys, but there was no difference in depression intensity between these two groups. Significant differences were found in terms of their age; older pupils report greater intensity of anxiety and depression. Looking at the anxiety symptoms structure we found the following differences; girls show greater frequencies of anxiety symptoms than boys. Through childhood those anxiety symptoms move from feelings of general anxiety and somatic difficulties at younger age to fear of school and future among older female students. Also, we found differences in the structure of depression symptoms for girls and boys; girls show more feelings of sadness, crying and suicidal thoughts, while boys show more behavioural problems. Furthermore, these symptoms were more frequent among older students than among younger.

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