25 - Childhood-Related Disorders

Abstract

This chapter reviews various childhood-related mental disorders within cross-cultural contexts. Disorders that are attributed more to sociopsychological factors such as child abuse, sexual abuse, parent-abuse by children, or emotional problems associated with sociocultural expectations, such as the so-called narraw-gate syndrome vary greatly cross-culturally in prevalence and variations in the nature of the problems. Of all the different kinds of childhood psychopathology, child abuse is relatively easy to compare and discuss cross-culturally as the concept of abuse is rather explicit, even though its actual definition and clinical recognition are subject to cultural variations. Certain facts in the cultural context can act either to increase the incidence of child abuse and neglect or to diminish the likelihood of their occurrence. The factors are the cultural value of children, beliefs about the categories of children, beliefs about child capabilities and developmental stages of children, and embeddedness of child rearing in kin and community networks. A unique form of child and adolescent psychopathology is observed in some Asian societies, including Japan and mainland China. It is called parent-abuse syndrome, and refers to the physical violence of an older child or adolescent toward his parents, mostly his mother. A boy growing up in such a situation, overprotected and exposed infrequently to a father figure for the required discipline, tended to become bullying, if not tyrannical. When he reached adolescence, he tended to exhibit violent behavior toward his parents if his needs were not satisfied, or when his parents tried to set limits on his behavior.