Concordance between mothers' reports and children's self-reports of depressive symptoms: a longitudinal study

Abstract

Objective: Developmental factors and maternal depression were examined for their impact on mother-child and clinician-child agreement concerning children's internal depressive symptoms.

Method: Data were derived from a clinically referred, racially mixed sample of school-age boys and girls (n = 113), with a study entry diagnosis of depression. Measures of agreement were based on parallel items from the self-rated Children's Depression Inventory, mother-rated Child Behavior Checklist, and clinician-rated, semistructured psychiatric interview with both the child and mother. Repeated measures of agreement were modeled longitudinally over a maximum of 7 years as a function of age, social-cognitive development, and maternal depression. Additional covariates were maternal psychopathology (excluding depression), socioeconomic status, and child's gender and verbal ability.

Results: Mother-child and clinician-child agreement increased as a function of the child's age during the follow-up and was consistently attenuated by maternal depression. Depressed mothers overrated their children's symptomatology as compared with the children's self-reports.

Conclusions: Clinicians should consider the young patient's age and level of maternal depression when weighing the relative merits of self-report and parental report of the child's depressive symptoms. Additional research is necessary to understand the mechanisms of change in parent-child agreement.