The interaction between health and personal anxiety in children

Abstract

Introduction

In modern health psychology there is a question of separating the concepts of “personal anxiety” and “health anxiety” and defining the interaction features and mutual influence between these concepts.

Objectives

To study the interaction between personal anxiety and health anxiety in children, taking into account the parents’ influence and depending on the child’s personal illness experience.

Methods

The sample: 145 respondents (46 frequently ill children (mean age 16.3±0.3), 41 rarely ill children (mean age 16.1±0.1), 28 parents of frequently ill children (mean age 44.9±0.8), 30 parents of rarely ill children (mean age 44.5±1.5)). We used: “Short Health Anxiety Inventory” (SHAI; Salkovskis et al., 2002), STAI (Spielberger, 2002).

Results

We find significant differences in the personal anxiety indicator (1.386, p≤0.01), which is higher in frequently ill children (moderate level of severity). Parents of frequently ill children have the same level of personal anxiety (no statistically significant differences) (12.825, p>0.05). For groups of rarely ill children and their parents we find significant differences (2.382, p≤0.01), and the level of personal anxiety is higher in children. The indicator of health anxiety in frequently and rarely ill children has no significant differences (9.265, p>0.05). The same is typical for rarely ill children and their parents while in the groups of frequently ill children and their parents this indicator has significant differences and is higher in parents (9.136, p ≤0.01).

Conclusions

The results show that health anxiety is an independent construct, the consideration of which should begin with non-clinical, normative forms of manifestation in both adults and children.