Affiliations: Department of Public Health Science and General
Practice, University of Oulu, Finland | Clinic of Child Psychiatry, University of Oulu,
Finland | Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Imperial
College Faculty of Medicine, London, UK
Note: [] Correspondence: Anja Taanila, PhD., Professor, University of
Oulu, Department of Public Health Science and General Practice, P.O. Box 5000,
90014 Oulu, Finland. Tel: -358-8-5375688, 040-5085513; fax: -358-8-5375661;
E-mail: anja.taanila@oulu.fi
Abstract: The aim was to study the prevalence of behavioural and emotional
problems among 8-year-old children with intellectual disability (ID) and to
compare their results to those obtained among the general child population in
the same cohort. In a prospective birth cohort study, parents filled in two
questionnaires and teachers assessed children's behaviour using the Rutter
scale (RB2). At the age of seven, the Northern Finland Birth cohort 1985/86
included 9357 children, of whom 106 had an intellectual disability. 44.4% of
the children with ID and 14.1% of the children without ID showed probable
psychiatric disturbances. In the group of children with ID, behavioural (20.8%)
and emotional (18.1%) problems were almost equally common, and hyper-activity
problems were frequent (36.1%), whereas in the group of children without ID,
behavioural problems (9.1%) and hyperactivity (9.3%) were more common than
emotional problems (4.9%). In both groups, boys had more problems than girls,
even though the difference was not statistically significant among the children
with ID. Over one third of the children with ID had additional disabilities,
but these did not increase the risk of having behavioural problems. Because
children's psychiatric disorders and behavioural problems are not only very
distressing to them and their families but also have a negative impact on their
learning at school, peer relationships and social competence, more attention
should be paid to preventing them by educational and environmental
interventions that support parents and teachers. (J Pediatr Neurol 2003; 1(1):
15–24).
