Current Issues around Child and Adolescent Behaviors

Department of Child Psychiatry, Chiba University Hospital, Japan

*Corresponding Author:

Akihiro Shiina, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor
Department of Child Psychiatry
Chiba University Hospital, Japan
Tel: +81-226-2297
E-mail: shiina-akihiro@faculty.chiba-u.jp

Received Date: December 24, 2012; Accepted Date: December 26, 2012; Published Date: December 28, 2012

Citation: Shiina A (2013) Current Issues around Child and Adolescent Behaviors. J Child Adolesc Behav 1:e101. doi:10.4172/2375-4494.1000e101

Copyright: © 2013 Shiina A, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Recently, we face too many challenges about mental and behavioral problems of child and adolescent.

A lot of mental disorders occur in childhood or adolescence. Not only schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, neurotic disorders, such as obsessive compulsive disorder, social anxiety disorder, and eating disorders are also likely to occur during adolescent or youngadulthood. Methods for precise diagnosis and treatment for their diseases are developing, but not have been adequately established yet. For example, bipolar disorder is a chronic disease whose onset occurs in adolescence, but is often misdiagnosed [1]. Finding biomarkers, such as Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) for major depressive disorders [2], and utilizing them to diagnose patients rapidly, and give them a tailor-made treatment are desired.

Developmental disorder is also one of important themes of child and adolescent psychiatry. Developmental disorders are regarded as a congenital disease, whose cause is associated to some factors. Besides the maternal age, recent studies mention the effects of paternal age on risk of autism spectrum disorder, one of the developmental disorders [3-5]. Since tendency to marry later has advanced in developed countries, the mechanism of onset of developmental disorders is to be studied. On the other hand, the prevalence rate of the autistic spectrum disorders has changed drastically, as from the previous 0.04%; today’s prevalence rate reaches nearly 1% [6]. It is doubtful that the increase of prevalence is explained by better recognition about this disease, and a tendency to marry later. We have to discuss how to set the standard of developmental disorder again, in addition to the investigation of biological etiology.

Moreover, how does nurturing environment affect the children’s mental activity and behavior is under discussion. It is likely that, abnormal circumstances, such as severe abuse or neglect cause the child anxiety, depression, or even PTSD [7]. However, the evidence about prevention of mental illnesses with a certain manners of nurture has not been obtained. Some politicians and specialists claim the necessity of traditional attitude of nurturing. Especially, arguments about the relationship between an aggressive behavior of a person and his or her familial environment tend to occurr in legal contexts. But, we must be always scientific and politically neutral about this issue.

We are to discuss these complicated problems with biological, psychological, and sociological view. Every scientific opinion is welcomed. We are pleased to share new findings with a lot of scientists all over the world.

References

1. Goldstein BI (2012) Recent progress in understanding pediatric bipolar disorder. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 166: 362-371.
2. Fuchikami M, Morinobu S, Segawa M, Okamoto Y, Yamawaki S, et al. (2011) DNA methylation profiles of the brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) gene as a potent diagnostic biomarker in major depression. PLoS One 6: e23881.
3. van Balkom ID, Bresnahan M, Vuijk PJ, Hubert J, Susser E, et al. (2012) Paternal age and risk of autism in an ethnically diverse, non-industrialized setting: Aruba. PLoS One 7: e45090.
4. Kong A, Frigge ML, Masson G, Besenbacher S, Sulem P, et al. (2012) Rate of de novo mutations and the importance of father's age to disease risk. Nature 488: 471-475.
5. Parner ET, Baron-Cohen S, Lauritsen MB, Jørgensen M, Schieve LA, et al. (2012) Parental age and autism spectrum disorders. Ann Epidemiol 22: 143-150.
6. Stankovic M, Lakic A, Ilic N (2012) Autism and autistic spectrum disorders in the context of new DSM-V classification, and clinical and epidemiological data. Srp Arh Celok Lek 140: 236-243.
7. Weich S, Patterson J, Shaw R, Stewart-Brown S (2009) Family relationships in childhood and common psychiatric disorders in later life: systematic review of prospective studies. Br J Psychiatry 194: 392-398.