Child psychopathology

Child psychopathology is a term referring to children and adolescents with a psychological disorder. Oppositional Defiant Disorder, Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and Pervasive Developmental Disorder are examples of child psychopathology. Social workers, psychologists and psychiatrists who work with mentally ill children are informed by research in developmental psychology, developmental psychopathology, clinical child psychology, and family systems.

The current trend in the U.S. is to understand child psychopathology from a systems based perspective called developmental psychopathology. Recent emphasis has also been on understanding psychological disorders from a relational perspective with attention also given to neurobiology.

Research and clinical work on child psychopathology tends to fall under several main areas: etiology, epidemiology, diagnosis, assessment, and treatment.