CHILDRENS INTERNALIZING AND EXTERNALIZING BEHAVIORS AND MATERNAL HEALTH-PROBLEMS

Examined the impact of a range of health related constructs reflecting maternal physical symptomatology, health services utilization, subjec tive health status, depressed mood, medical-psychological complaints, and marital adjustment on children's internalizing and externalizing b ehavior problems in a community sample (N = 145). Physical symptomatol ogy predicted a general second-order latent factor of children's behav ior problems. Depressed mood predicted a primary latent factor of inte rnalizing child behavior problems. Seizure symptoms, and more health p roblems in the last 4 years specifically predicted child psychosomatic complaints/anxiety. Thus, general physical symptoms predicted a broad spectrum of problem behaviors, whereas specific mental or physical he alth problems predicted similar distinct problem behavior syndromes. I mplications of these results for identifying children at risk for psyc hopathology, and the relevance of social learning theory and a broader based family systems approach are discussed.