Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Children’s behavioral and emotional problems have allegedly exploded in the past two decades, with many more children diagnosed with mental health disorders and a surging population of youth who are medicated. Prior research suggests that lower social class status is a key factor affecting children’s problem behavior. Using a nationally representative, longitudinal study of 15,305 third graders, this study extends prior research by pointing to how children’s mental health disorders are socially created and constructed. Descriptive results show that poor children exhibit more problem behaviors and emotions and they are also channeled to professionals for attention problems (but not emotional problems) at higher rates. Yet multi-variate analyses show that at the same levels of negative behavior, it is higher income, white, and male children that are (disproportionately) evaluated for attention and emotional problems. These “low-achieving” high-status children are defined as having medical problems that must be cured. Negative implications for children at each end of the socio-economic spectrum are discussed.

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