Parent--Child Agreement Regarding Children's Acute Stress: The Role of Parent Acute Stress Reactions

• NCJ Number: 216598
• Journal: Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Volume: 45 Issue: 12 Dated: December 2006 Pages: 1485-1493
• Author(s): Nancy Kassam-Adams Ph.D.; J. Felipe Garcia-Espana Ph.D.; Victoria A. Miller Ph.D.; Flaura Winston Ph.D.
• Date Published: December 2006
• Length: 9 pages
• Grant Number(s): R40MC00138
• Sponsoring Agency: US Dept of Health and Human Services
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research)
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This study examined the extent to which parents and children agreed in their reports of the severity of the child's symptoms of acute stress disorder (ASD) following an injury to the child, as well as how the severity of parents' acute stress influenced their ratings of their child's acute stress symptoms.

Abstract

The findings indicate that many children and their parents do not share the same view of the child's reaction in the aftermath of an acute injury. Parent--child agreement was low regarding the presence and overall severity of child acute stress reactions. The study identified an important source of potential bias in parental reports on their children. Results clearly show that parents' own reactions following their child's injury can influence their assessment of their child's symptoms. This suggests that clinicians should obtain child self-reports of acute stress disorder whenever possible. They should also take into account parent symptoms of ASD when interpreting parent reports. Parent--hild pairs (n=219) were assessed within 1 month of a child's injury. Parent--child agreement was examined regarding the presence of acute stress disorder in the child, as well as its severity and specific symptoms. 4 tables, 1 figure, and 34 references