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Published on: June 17, 2013
Paths to panic disorder/agoraphobia: an exploratory analysis from age 3 to 21 in an unselected birth cohort
M G Craske1, R Poulton, J C Tsao
1Department of Psychology, University of California at Los Angeles, 90095-1563, USA. craske@psych.ucla.edu
Objective:
To evaluate childhood temperamental traits and early illness experiences in the etiology of adult panic disorder with agoraphobia.
Method:
Evaluated temperamental and illness experience factors, at ages 3 through 18, as predictors of panic and agoraphobia at ages 18 or 21 in an unselected sample (N = 992). Analyses were conducted with classification trees.
Results:
Experience with respiratory ill health predicted panic/agoraphobia relative to other anxiety disorders and healthy controls. Also, temperamental emotional reactivity at age 3 predicted panic/agoraphobia in males but did not predict other anxiety disorders, compared with healthy controls. Furthermore, temperament and ill health interacted with gender.
Conclusions:
Results are discussed in terms of cognitive theories of fear of physical symptoms and biological models of respiratory disturbance for panic/agoraphobia.
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