The Prevention of Depression in 8- to 9-Year-Old Children: A Pilot Study

Abstract

The outcomes of a new universal program aimed at preventing depressive symptoms and disorders in 8- to 9-year-old children are presented. The Positive Thinking Program is a mental health promotion program based on cognitive and behavioural strategies. It is designed to meet the developmental needs of children in the middle primary school Years 4 and 5. Four state primary schools were randomly assigned to receive the program implemented by psychologists or to a control condition involving their regular Health Education curriculum. Seventy-two children participated in the intervention condition and 48 children in the control condition. Children completed measures of depressive and anxiety symptomatology, depressive disorders, and attribution style. The intervention was associated with reductions in depressive symptoms and more positive attributions at post-intervention. Compared to the control group, there was a lower prevalence of depressive disorders at posttest and fewer intervention group children developed a depressive disorder at a 9-month follow-up.

Les programmes préventifs en milieu scolaire auprès des enfants et des adolescents présentant de l’anxiété

“…À part le FRIENDS, une multitude d'autres programmes ont été mis sur pied dans le but de prévenir l'anxiété chez les enfants et les adolescents en milieu scolaire, dont le Anxiety Management Training (Hains, 1992), le Positive Communication Program (Garaigordobil, 2004), le Positive Thinking Program (Rooney et al, 2006), le Stress Management Intervention (Hains et Ellmann, 1994) et le Taming Worry Dragons (Short, 1993). Nous ne présenterons pas tous ces programmes en détail en raison de l'espace limité de cet article.…”

Developing a model of mental health self-care support for children and young people through an integrated evaluation of available types of provision involving systematic review, meta-analysis and case study

“…Many could be -indeed some were -described as tasks, a word that can have negative connotations. There were a few exceptions -the explicit use of games in Rooney 2006 105 and the use of drama, dance and music in Tol 2008, 128 for example -though it is worth noting that a lack of reference to creativity and fun in the descriptions of the interventions may be more to do with the sober writing style demanded of academic journals than with design faults in the interventions.…”

“…running summer camps and liaising with teachers (MTA 1999 95 ), or facilitating the child in the home-school environment (Pfiffner 2007 102 ). In three-quarters (53/71) of the studies, the agents were trained specifically for the intervention, 39,[45][46][47][48][49][50][51][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][62][63][64][65][66][67][68][72][73][74][77][78][79][82][83][84][85][86][87][88][89][90]93,94,99,100,[103][104][105][106][108][109]…”

A meta-analytic review on the prevention of symptoms of anxiety in children and adolescents

“…They included 35 studies in which anxiety prevention was the primary goal. However, there are a considerable number of additional studies dealing with the prevention of depression in childhood and adolescents (e.g., Sheffield et al, 2006;Rooney et al, 2006) or other child or adolescent mental health problems (e.g., Kraag, Van Breukelen, Kok, & Hosman, 2009) which aimed at the prevention of anxiety as a secondary goal. There are several reasons for the inclusion of these studies in a comprehensive meta-analytic review on anxiety prevention in childhood and adolescents.…”