Suchergebnisse

A new research strategy is proposed that supplements current research approaches by measuring a person's activity and mental state in daily life settings, thereby taken a step toward ecologically validating diagnosis. This approach is embedded in a multi-method, multi-level design that cascades from ethnography and population and small group statistics to the indepth, time sampling of individuals. In the model, methods such as community surveys, in-care registration statistics, social network analysis, snowball sampling of hidden populations and focus groups of specific problems are linked. The intensive study of the person with the Experience Sampling Method stands central in the model and is illustrated in detail. This design attempts to adjust shortcomings in current research by providing supplementary information at a variety of qualitative and quantitative levels for use in cross-cultural research, service planning and personalized treatment.

Disturbances in affect have been linked to problem behavior in adolescence and future psychopathology, but little is known about how such disturbances manifest themselves in everyday contexts. This study investigated daily mood in Dutch 7th graders, aged 11–14. Cluster analysis of problem measures distinguished high‐risk (n=25) and low‐risk (n=106) subgroups. Participants completed experience‐sampling reports of mood, social context, and location nine times daily for 5 days. Multilevel regression analyses of four mood measures confirmed higher anxiety and depressed mood in the high‐risk group. Moods varied by location and social context, with significant differences between groups in two specific social contexts. First, when with family, low‐risk adolescents felt less depressed than when alone, whereas high‐risk adolescents felt more depressed. Second, high‐risk adolescents showed more pronounced anxiety in social situations outside the network of family and friends. These findings point to everyday social contexts in which young adolescents with emotional and behavioral problems appear to be particularly vulnerable.