Abstract
In a longitudinal developmental study, 90 boys and girls participated in a psychological investigation and were medically examined when they were 11, 13, 15 and 18 years old. Habitual somatic discomfort was assessed by means of a questionnaire. Frequency of reported symptoms reached a peak at age-level 13. Females reported more symptoms than males at age 15 and 18, and the constancy over age of the symptoms was greater in the female group. Frequency of discomfort symptoms was unrelated to the variables of the medical examinations, but positively related to measures of anxiety, and negatively related to satisfaction with the situation at home and (at some age levels) to self-esteem and to experienced attractiveness and body-image satisfaction. At age-level 18, frequency of symptoms was (a) negatively related in the male and positively in the female group to overachievement in school, and (b) negatively related, in both sexes, to neuroendocrinological reactivity to examination stress in subjects taking the matriculation examinations.
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