In our neuropsychology practice we see a large number of children with special health care needs (i.e., medical conditions) as well as children with neurodevelopmental or psychiatric conditions (autism, language impaiments, ADHD). Although the main goal of these evaluations is to identify their patterns of cognitive strengths and weaknesses to guide intervention, we always evaluate the current mental health functioning of these children. We do this because we often see that these children have high levels of anxiety and depression, which many times go unnoticed.  Although this is a very common clinical observation, and many studies have shown that specific chronic physical or developmental conditions are associated with internalizing mental health symptoms (depression and anxiety), less is know about the prevalence of mental health symptoms in this population and the factors that increase the risk for experiencing or developing internalizing symptoms. Read More…

Do you remember the Mozart Effect? In the 1990s a small yet very influential study showed that listening to classical music, and in particular Mozart, improved test performance in college students -thus Mozart must make you smarter! The public reacted and an entire industry was born. Parents rushed to the stores to purchase Mozart CDs so they could play it to their unborn children (hopefully not Mozart’s Requiem – which, although is one of my favorite works of all time, it is bound to traumatize anyone under 14). Even the State of Georgia passed a law requiring the free distribution of CDs to new mothers! The Governor at the time was widely quoted saying:

As you know, the brain has two lobes. The studies show that music engages both hemispheres of the brain — its creativity and emotion engage the right lobe, while rhythm and pitch engage the left. So people who receive musical exposure at a young age develop a bundle of nerves that connects those two halves* Read More…

In an article soon to be published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry I, with a colleague at the University of Pittsburgh, discuss the need for a new approach to the development of early therapeutic interventions for child depression, as current interventions are, sadly, barely effective (see this article for a more extensive discussion on the efficacy of child depression treatments). Our basic argument is that most current interventions are not designed to address the underlying processes and pathways that lead to the emergence of depression in childhood. This is partially due to a disconnect between what we know about the development of child depression (basic science) and how clinicians are trained to diagnosed and work with these conditions.  So I was not surprised, although I was excited, when I read a new article in the same journal that discussed the need for the development of new early interventions for the treatment of ADHD. In this article, the authors use many of the same arguments we use to advocate for new child depression treatments. I was excited because this is a reflection of the ongoing changes in our entire field that advocate for 1) a reconceptualization of ‘disorder’ and its onset, and 2) more ‘translational science’ or the translation of basic scientific discoveries into clinical and practical applications. Read More…

December was a good month for the US military in Iraq; not a single casualty was reported. Unfortunately, the story was not as rosy in Afghanistan, where 20 service members died -not including the 7 CIA officers who tragically died last week.  When we see footage of military funerals on films (e.g., Kavin Bacon’s “Taking Chance”), documentaries (HBO’s “Section 60″), or on the news, our thoughts are usually with the surviving family, as we can understand how difficult and devastating it must be to adapt to the death of a loved one.  However, outside of the military community, there is little discussion about how war-time casualties affect other military families who are about to be deployed or are currently deployed. Thus, the difficulties and struggles that families endure when adjusting to the deployment of a parent are most likely compounded during war times given the increased risks that deployed personnel endure. Surprisingly, little is know about how children of deployed military personnel compare to their non-military peers in regards to their academic, social, and emotional functioning. Specifically, we know very little about the factors that may contribute to, or hamper, the children’s adjustments to parental deployment during war times. Read More…

I have received many emails about yesterday’s post on the CDC autism prevalence study. I thought I would spend some time to briefly address 3 specific issues.

1. Prevalence Rates and Home Schooling.

I received a thoughtful email about the impact of home schooling on the CDC prevalence rate and autism research in general, given that many children with ASDs may be home schooled. Here is my response: Read More…