A survey on the family and clinical characteristics and social competency of children and adolescents who talk about killing self / 中华行为医学与脑科学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To analyze the family and clinical characteristics of talking about killing self (TAKS) among children and adolescents and its relationship with social competency.Methods One thousand nine hundred and seventy-five 7-17-year-old students from 12 schools (each four for primary,middle and high schools) of Wuhan area,were approached through multistage random cluster sampling,and administered with a self-designed general information questionnaire and the Chinese version of Children' s Depression Inventory.In addition,subjects' parents completed Achenbach' s Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL).TAKS was judged based on item 91 (talk about killing self) of CBCL.Multiple Logistic Regression was used to identify factors associated with TAKS.Results The half-year prevalence rate (95％ CI) of parent-reported TAKS was 4.1％ (3.2％,5.0％).TAKS was significantly associated with bad marital status of parents (OR=2.29),unemployment of fathers (OR=2.07),frequently jangling between father and mother (OR=2.23),parents ever having fought with each other intensely (OR=2.00),being frequently bullied by classmates (OR=2.11),internal behavior problem (OR=2.28),external behavior problem (OR=2.50) and depressive symptoms (OR=4.83).TAKS subjects had significantly lower social compctency score than non-TAKS subjects((18.8±7.6) vs.(20.9±6.9),P=0.007).Conclusion The prevalence of TAKS is higher among children and adolescents with several disadvantaged family factors,behavior problems and depression.Children and adolescents with TAKS also have worse social competency.More close clinical attention should be paid to such phenomenon.