Interviewers' notes about section G: Generalised anxiety

In this section, you are trying to find out whether the child worries so much, and about so many things, that this really interferes with his or her life and leads to physical symptoms such as being tense or not being able to get to sleep. Children with generalized anxiety have many different worries about many different things. Some worries are about the past, some about the future, some about schoolwork, some about their appearance, some about illness, and so on. The worries are present across different situations. So they may have one set of worries at home and a different set of worries at school.

What the clinical raters will need to know is whether the child has multiple worries after setting aside any worries or fears that have already been covered by the previous sections on separation anxiety, phobias and obsessions. So if the child has many worries but they are all related to separation anxiety, he or she won't also be diagnosed as having generalized anxiety. Similarly, the clinical raters won't give a child the diagnosis of generalized anxiety if he or she has several different worries that all have the same general theme, e.g. if the child has worries about exams, about getting homework done, about being late for school and about being told off by the teacher, but has no other worries relating to home life, friendships, bad luck, the future and so on.

So you can see why it isn't easy for the clinical raters to make a diagnosis of generalized anxiety unless you have provided them with a good description of the child's worries - exactly what they worry about, and how severe those worries are. A good description makes all the difference when the raters have to decide if the child has multiple worries, and if these are different from the worries and fears that were covered by the preceding sections of the interview.

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Last modified : 05/09/09