[Juvenile depressive syndromes]

Depressive states can appear in different phases of life. They differ in their phenomenology according to type, dynamics and power of the etiologic factors, as well as to the moment of their appearance in a child's life. Therefore, depressive syndromes during infancy and childhood are very diverse. Depression in childhood is psychopathologically more complex than it is in adulthood, because it occurs in a developing organism. A differential typologic order according to nosologic aspects is difficult to establish. A division into psychogen-reactive, neurotic, organic, structural and endogenous-psychotic depression is only an attempt toward a rough orientation. Contrary to depressive illnesses in adulthood, anaclitic, reactive and neurotic depressions are most frequent in childhood. They are always due to inconvenient relations to and identification with the significant other of the child. There are dynamic interrelations between the different depressive states in childhood. Already in the early phases of development, the foundations are laid for the possible later development in melancholia.