School phobia and other childhood neuroses: a systematic study of the children and their families

Abstract

The authors developed reliable clinical rating scales to compare 35 children with school phobia and their families with a matched sample of children with other neuroses and their families. Twice as many school phobic children as children with other neuroses showed excessive separation anxiety, dependency, and depression. Although a mutually hostile-dependent interaction was found in most of the families of children with school phobia, the development of school phobia appeared to be dependent on defects in character development in the children as well. The authors discuss the etiological significance of the almost universal parental pathology and family malfunction for both groups of children.