Assessing depression in prepubertal children

Although symptoms of major depression are the same in adults and prepubertal children, diagnosing depression in children presents special problems not encountered with adults. In addition to the standard clinical interview, methods of assessing childhood depression include diagnostic interviews, self-report inventories, projective tests, peer ratings, and biological markers. Unfortunately many of these methods currently lack detailed reliability and validity studies. Despite their limitations these techniques can be helpful in making a diagnosis. However, accurate diagnosis still requires careful evaluation and individualized clinical judgement.