Searching for evidence on the validity of generalized anxiety disorder: Psychopathology in children of anxious mothers

Abstract

The diagnostic validity of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is tested by examining the relationship between GAD in mothers and children's overanxious disorder (OAD), separation anxiety (SA), and anxious symptoms in 331 mother-child dyads from a geographically based probability sample. Data on the relationship between mothers' major depressive disorder (MDD) and children's depression are presented for comparison. The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Diagnostic Interview Schedule (DIS) was used in mothers and the NIMH Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children (DISC), in children. Children of mother with GAD were not at increased risk for OAD, SA, or anxious symptoms. In contrast, MDD in mothers conferred a risk for OAD in younger children and of MDD in older children. Additionally, older children of depressed mothers exhibited significantly more depressive symptoms. The presence of diffuse anxiety in children of mothers with MDD may represent a non-specific response pattern in psychiatrically vulnerable children. Like GAD in adults, these anxiety symptoms in children may constitute a prodromal manifestation of other disorders and transient responses to life stressors.