Childhood Anxiety Disorders: When to Worry About an Anxious Child - 0 views
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I recommend asking the parent to complete the Spence Preschool Anxiety Scale for a quick, reliable measure of anxiety in young children who can’t necessarily express their feelings.
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To help determine whether anxiety is impairing or interfering in children’s lives, I ask the following questions using the acronym FISH. (This can be applied to children of all ages.) Frequency — What is the frequency of the child’s anxious behaviors? Is it every day? Once a week? Once a month? Intensity — How intense is the child’s anxiety on a scale of 1 to 10? Severity — How severe is the child’s anxiety on a scale of 1 to 10? How long — How long have anxious behaviors occurred?
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The following tendencies among children should send up red flags: Overestimating a threat: “I’m going to get COVID. I’m going to die.” Difficulty tolerating uncertainty: “I don’t know what’s going to happen if I go to school. What’s going to be there? I don’t know that I can handle it.” Underestimating the ability to control a situation: “I never will be able to handle all this uncertainly. It is going make me really sick to my stomach or feel like I’m going to die.” Feeling increased responsibility: “If I get sick and I get my parents sick, it’s my fault. They will never forgive me.”
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