Behavioural and emotional difficulties in students attending schools for children and adolescents with severe intellectual disability

Background For several decades. researchers and clinicians have been aware of an increased prevalence of psychiatric disorder in children with intelle ctual disability. However, there are few research studies Exploring this is sue. Methods The parents of 123 children attending schools for children with 'se vere learning difficulties' completed the Developmental Behaviour Checklist (DBC) in order to identify those children with clinically significant beha vioural and emotional problems. Comparisons were made with norms for the DB C and a range of child variables were investigated as possible correlates o f disorder. Results Some 50.4% of the children scored above the cut-off on the DBC for psychiatric disorder. The child's severity of physical disability was relat ed most strongly to parental ratings of behavioural and emotional problems. There were also effects for the child's age and the absence of Down's synd rome. Conclusions The present study confirms previous research findings of a high prevalence of behavioural and emotional difficulties amongst children with intellectual disability, and identifies a number of correlates of disorder which require further investigation.