Perception of malocclusion in 11-year-old children: a comparison between personal and parental awareness

In orthodontic counselling an understanding of how individuals perceive their occlusal features is important to ensure effective communication and for provision of adequate advice on treatment need. The purpose of the present study was to assess personal and parental awareness of malocclusion in children, and to examine whether agreement existed between children and their parents on assessments of malocclusion traits. Of 104 randomly selected fourth-grade children 99 presented themselves at a public dental clinic. Ninety-three accompanying parents attended. Awareness was assessed by comparing the opinion of parents and children on the presence or absence of anterior malocclusion with direct measurements on dental study casts. The subjects' abilities to identify a polaroid of the child's dentition in a panel of 17 alternative photographs were also used as a measure of awareness. The findings revealed a moderate level of awareness among both the children and their parents. About half of the children and the parents identified the child's photograph on the first attempt. About three-quarters of the traits recorded as marked/severe malocclusion and about half of the mild/moderate traits were recognized. A significant association existed between the number of correct reports on traits given by the children and the parents. However, agreement across professional, child, and parental assessments varied for the different traits. The results indicated that the individual's comprehension of professional terms may be unclear and that professionally defined cut-off points often do not coincide with norms existing within the actual family unit.