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Psychophysiological Assessment of the Effectiveness of Emotion Regulation Strategies in Childhood
08:09

Psychophysiological Assessment of the Effectiveness of Emotion Regulation Strategies in Childhood

Published on: February 11, 2017

Professional identification of psychosocial problems among children from ethnic minority groups: room for improvement

Mathilde R Crone1, Nienke Bekkema, Carin H Wiefferink

  • 1Leiden University Medical Center, Department of Public Health and Primary Care, PO Box 9600, 2300 RC Leiden, The Netherlands. m.r.crone@lumc.nl

The Journal of Pediatrics
|November 7, 2009
PubMed

Insights

Child health professionals (CHPs) identified fewer psychosocial problems in children from nonindustrialized countries. Enhancing parental disclosure of concerns may improve problem identification, particularly for these groups.

Area of Science:

  • Child Health
  • Psychosocial Development
  • Cross-cultural Pediatrics

Background:

  • Identifying psychosocial problems in children is crucial for timely intervention.
  • Disparities in identification may exist between children from industrialized and nonindustrialized countries.
  • Parental concerns can be a valuable indicator of child psychosocial well-being.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To evaluate the effectiveness of child health care professionals (CHPs) in identifying psychosocial issues in children from diverse backgrounds.
  • To determine if parental concerns improve CHP's ability to identify these problems.

Main Methods:

  • Data collected during routine well-child visits for children aged 5-12 years from various ethnic origins.
  • Child health care professionals reported identified psychosocial problems.
  • Parents completed the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) and a concerns questionnaire, with interpreter services utilized.

Main Results:

  • Children from nonindustrialized countries showed higher prevalence of elevated CBCL scores (10% total, 17% internalizing) compared to those from industrialized countries (3% total, 5% internalizing).
  • CHPs identified only 30% of Turkish and Moroccan children with elevated scores, versus 60% of children from industrialized countries.
  • Parental concerns correlated with elevated CBCL scores but not with CHP identification.

Conclusions:

  • Child health care professionals face challenges in identifying psychosocial problems, especially in children from nonindustrialized backgrounds.
  • Improved methods for parents to voice concerns could enhance problem detection.
  • Targeted support is needed to improve identification rates among vulnerable pediatric populations.
Abstract

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