Is This Behavior Normal? Mental Illness in Children

By Janice Lovelace, Ph.D.

“My daughter is staying in her room and sleeping a lot. She hasn’t made many friends since we moved here six months ago to live with my mother. It is hard to get her up in the morning to go to school. Sometimes she says she doesn’t feel well. When I took her to the pediatrician he suggested she might be depressed and we should go to counseling. I’ve been depressed before, but thought that 9 years old is too young for depression. Don’t all children go through rough periods like this?”

This girl presented a constellation of symptoms we see in depressed children: isolation, sadness, withdrawal from activities, family history and a precipitating event. Her mother, like many parents I have seen as a child psychologist, wasn’t sure which behaviors are in the normal range for children and which might be indicators of emotional difficulties. Because of the wide range of developmental skills, it can be difficult for parents to recognize and professionals to diagnose emotional struggles in children.

One reason is that many young children are not able to verbalize how they are feeling. It is important that parents, teachers and other adults in a child’s life pay attention to the child’s behaviors and any changes. If parents notice changes in behavior, it might help to decide if the current behavior is normal for that child. They should also look for patterns of behavior, rather than isolated incidents after a loss or sad event.

Some behaviors are developmental – they may be normal at one age, but not another. An example is that a tantrum by a 2-year-old who doesn’t want to do something might not be unusual, but a tantrum by a 10-year-old might be. Some behaviors may be expected after a traumatic experience, like abuse or a serious accident. In addition, young children might regress to an earlier behavior when a new sibling is born, but that regression is generally not seen in older school-age children. Children who are under stress, at home or at school, or who experience loss are at greater risk for having problems adjusting and may need professional help.

Figures on how many children suffer from mental health disorders vary widely, with 10 percent being an accepted average. On the higher end of the scale, the U.S. Surgeon General’s 2001 Report on Mental Health states that almost 21 percent of children and adolescents ages 9 to 17 had a mental or addictive disorder. The President’s New Freedom Commission estimated in 2002 that every classroom in the nation has one or two children with severe emotional problems.