The effects of age and sex on depression ratings in children and adolescents.

The self-reports of depressive symptomatology of the 89 children and the parental reports of 62 parents whose children had such symptoms from a sample of 220 children, aged 6 to 23 years, in a family-genetic study of children at high and low risk of depression were examined for the effects of the age and sex of the child. The age of the child at interview proved to have a significant effect upon the dating of the onset of dysphoric episodes and the dating of the worst ever episode of dysphoria. The older girls reported about two more depressive symptoms on average than the younger girls. This finding was obscured unless account was taken of the age at which the subjects were interviewed. However, these effects did not apply to a group of melancholia-related symptoms. There were no consistent effects of age at interview or age at episode on the symptom reports of the boys or in the reports from the parents about both their male and female children.