Depression in Children's Lives

The most important emphasis is the focus on children's lives, which combines child and parent depressive contexts.

Keith Crnic (Author), Betty Lin (Author)

9781108814805, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 26 August 2021

75 pages
22.8 x 15 x 0.6 cm, 0.17 kg

Although childhood depressive disorders are relatively rare, the experience of depression in children's lives is not. Developmental contextual perspectives denote the importance of considering both depressive disorder and the experience of subclinical depressive symptoms in the child and the family to fully understand the implications of depressive experience for children's developmental well-being. This Element draws on basic emotion development and developmental psychopathology perspectives to address the nature of depressive experience in childhood, both symptoms and disorder, focusing on seminal and recent research that details critical issues regarding its phenomenology, epidemiology, continuity, etiology, consequences, and interventions to ameliorate the developmental challenges inherent in the experience. These issues are addressed within the context of the child's own experience and from the perspective of parent depression as a critical context that influences children's developmental well-being. Conclusions include suggestions for new directions in research on children's lives that focus on more systemic processes.

1. Introduction
2. Current Perspectives on Childhood Depression
3. Epidemiology of Depression in Children's Lives
4. Developmental Expression and Continuity
5. Risk Factors and the Emergence of Childhood Depression
6. Developmental Consequences of Depression in Children's Lives
7. Interventions for Depression in Children's Lives
8. Conclusions.

Subject Areas: Psychology: emotions [JMQ], Family psychology [JMF], Child & developmental psychology [JMC]