Sheryl Olson, Professor of Psychology

Defining Psychopathology in Children and Adolescents: The Critical Importance of Developmental and Environmental Contexts

How do we make judgments about the presence of psychopathology in children and adolescents? This is a foundational and controversial issue in clinical science that has strong implications for clinical practice and everyday life. I discuss current criteria that are used to define psychopathology in children and adolescents, highlighting the importance of developmental issues and the child’s lived experiences in different environmental settings, including diverse cultures. I give brief examples from my own research, which has focused on early developmental contributions to psychopathology, and more recently, how parents in different cultural settings define, explain, and manage challenging behaviors in their young children. Finally, I show how current practices fail to incorporate developmental and contextual issues into their diagnostic criteria, with potentially adverse consequences for children, families, and their broader communities.

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