PSYCHIATRIC ASSESSMENT OF TODDLERS BASED ON MOTHER-CHILD INTERACTION

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This project brings together the strengths of clinical psychiatry and developmental psychology in developing two means of assessing adaptation and maladptation in toddlers. The child and his/her mother are observed in interaction in six situations which include variations in stress, relaxation, and pleasure. To date, 90 child-mother dyads have been scored. The clinical judgment of the child's risk for the later development of psychopathology and the behavioral rating of the child's risk correlate at the level of .79, p. less than .00l. What is indicated by this finding is: We now have a reasonable model of the clinician's functioning as he synthesizes his observation of the child's behavior; 64% of the variance in the clinician's judgment is accounted for via the summarization of the behavioral observation. The behavioral observation system is more conservative in giving high or moderate risk scores to the child in that it requires an overall pattern of poor functioning (12% of the children received risk scores of moderate or severe). In addition to these children, the clinician's judgment also gives high or moderate risk status to children who may show infrequent, but severe patterns of problematic behavior (21% of the children). Follow-up research will indicate which of these patterns of vulnerability is most predictive of later psychiatric problems.