TY - JOUR PY - 2023// TI - Somatic and depressive symptoms among children from Latin America and the English-speaking Caribbean JO - Clinical child psychology and psychiatry A1 - Gibson, Roger C. A1 - Lowe, Gillian A1 - Lipps, Garth A1 - Jules, Mia A. A1 - Romero-Acosta, Kelly A1 - Daley, Avril SP - ePub EP - ePub VL - ePub IS - ePub N2 - BACKGROUND: The extent to which depression is associated with somatic complaints in children from the English-speaking Caribbean and Latin America is not well established.

OBJECTIVE: We sought to explore the association between depressive and somatic symptoms among children from the English-speaking Caribbean and Latin America, while accounting for age, sex, socioeconomic status, cultural background, and anxiety score.

METHOD: 1541 elementary school children, ages 9-12 years, from the English-speaking Caribbean and Latin America completed the Adolescent Depression Rating Scale (ARDS), the Numeric 0-10 Anxiety Self-Report Scale and the Children's Somatic Symptom Inventory-24 (CSSI-24). T-tests and ANOVA's were used to compare CSSI-24 and ARDS scores among countries, and the CSSI-24 scores of children with (ARDS ≥ 4) and without likely clinically significant depression. Regression analyses assessed possible predictors of CSSI-24 score.

RESULTS: Depressive and somatic symptom scores were highest among the Jamaican children and lowest among the Colombian children (p <.001). Children with likely clinically significant depression exhibited higher mean somatic symptom scores (p <.001). Depressive symptom scores predicted somatic symptom scores (p <.001).

CONCLUSIONS: Depressive symptoms were a strong predictor of reporting somatic symptoms. Knowledge of this association may facilitate better recognition of depression among youth.

Language: en

LA - en SN - 1359-1045 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/13591045231178890 ID - ref1 ER -