1. Specific and social fears in children and adolescents: separating normative fears from problem indicators and phobias
- Author
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Gisele Gus Manfro, Luis Augusto Rohde, Giovanni Abrahão Salum, Lauren S. Wakschlag, Paola Paganella Laporte, Euripedes Constantino Miguel, Maurício Scopel Hoffmann, Pedro Mario Pan, and Daniel S. Pine
- Subjects
Male ,Psychometrics ,Adolescent ,child/adolescent ,lcsh:RC435-571 ,Poison control ,Developmental psychopathology ,phobia/phobic disorders ,Social Environment ,Suicide prevention ,Severity of Illness Index ,behavioral disciplines and activities ,Specific phobia ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Risk Factors ,Surveys and Questionnaires ,lcsh:Psychiatry ,medicine ,specific/social fears ,Humans ,Child ,Psychiatric Status Rating Scales ,Phobias ,Social environment ,Fear ,Reference Standards ,medicine.disease ,Confirmatory factor analysis ,030227 psychiatry ,Psychiatry and Mental health ,Phobic Disorders ,ROC Curve ,Normative ,Original Article ,Female ,anxiety/anxiety disorders ,Psychology ,Factor Analysis, Statistical ,030217 neurology & neurosurgery ,Clinical psychology - Abstract
Objective: To distinguish normative fears from problematic fears and phobias. Methods: We investigated 2,512 children and adolescents from a large community school-based study, the High Risk Study for Psychiatric Disorders. Parent reports of 18 fears and psychiatric diagnosis were investigated. We used two analytical approaches: confirmatory factor analysis (CFA)/item response theory (IRT) and nonparametric receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. Results: According to IRT and ROC analyses, social fears are more likely to indicate problems and phobias than specific fears. Most specific fears were normative when mild; all specific fears indicate problems when pervasive. In addition, the situational fear of toilets and people who look unusual were highly indicative of specific phobia. Among social fears, those not restricted to performance and fear of writing in front of others indicate problems when mild. All social fears indicate problems and are highly indicative of social phobia when pervasive. Conclusion: These preliminary findings provide guidance for clinicians and researchers to determine the boundaries that separate normative fears from problem indicators in children and adolescents, and indicate a differential severity threshold for specific and social fears.
- Published
- 2017