Childhood depression: teachers' and children's perceptions of the symptoms and causes of depression in Jordan

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this thesis is to scrutinise the situation of children with depression in Jordan. The Jordanian translation of the Children’s Depression Inventory (CDI) is used in this study. The original sample on which the study tools were applied consisted of 534 children. The data was analysed according to the SPSS programme. The results of the study show that the Jordanian translation of the Children’s Depression Inventory (CDI) has been shown to provide high internal reliability Cronbach’s alpha =0. 89. The results of this study indicate that by using a cut-off score of 19 or more 33 children with a prevalence rate of 6.5 % forms a group with severe depression and there are no significant differences between boys and girls in the prevalence of depression. The findings of this study also indicate that there are seven statistical significant differences between boys and girls in manifesting the symptoms of depression on the items of Children’s Depression Inventory. The comparisons indicated that girls exhibited suicidal ideation, feelings of wanting to cry difficulties in making up their mind and physical and vegetative symptoms such as change in appetite and sleep disturbance more often than boys do. The results of the study show that there is no single cause of depression and it is extremely difficult to separate the different causes. All the children in this study discuss how the environmental factors cause the depressed feelings. Children expressed different feelings and reactions in regard to having depressed feelings. From the analysis of the findings of the students’ interviews two major categories were found, which were related to the home and to the school factors. According to the home three subcategories were found: parental practices, family conflict and economic status. School factors are also considered as a major category according to the children’s interviews this factor also has three subcategories, which may be described as follows: teacher-student relationship, negative attitudes toward schools and limited school activities.