Comparison of the body image of healthy and emotionally disturbed or physically ill children by KBMT-K

Initially some results from empirical studies regarding body satisfaction a nd differentiation of body experience of children are described. Method: In our study several groups of children showing different kinds of illness at the age of eight to twelve years were subjected to the "Korperbildmaltest fur Kinder" (KBMT-K, Gunter) (Colour-A-Person-Dissatisfaction-Test for Chil dren), a depression inventory and an anxiety test, Furthermore we examined the children's body knowledge. We assessed two samples of children in psych iatric and psychotherapeutic inpatient treatment. The diagnoses were disrup tive behaviour (n = 32) or emotional disturbances (n = 36), Three other gro ups were formed of children with somatic chronic illnesses (asthmatics (n = 47), inpatient diabetics (n=34) and outpatient diabetics (n = 30)). We com pared the test scores with those of healthy children. Results: Only the you nger (eight to ten years old) children of both samples showed a significant ly lower body satisfaction in comparison to healthy children, the young gir ls with a chronic somatic illness having the lowest scores. Older girls wit h a chronic somatic illness (aged 11 or 12 years) had a significantly poore r differentiation of their body experience than the healthy peers, a findin g we had not expected in advance. Comparing the different clinical samples with the healthy sample, only the emotionally disturbed children were signi ficantly more dissatisfied with their own body. Whereas we were able to dem onstrate by statistical analyses that in addition to the illness, depressio n and anxiety had an impact on body image, the knowledge of the body did no t influence the above-mentioned concepts. The results are discussed.