Assssing Depression in a Child
By
Danielle N. Burnett
Dr. MARSHA HARBIN
PSYCH/610 Research Methodology
April 6, 2015
Assssing Depression in a Child Introduction: In life, people will go through so many fantastic and memorable moments in their lives. They will get married, buy a house, get a new car, buy a dog, finish college, start a career and have a child. That moment when you first find out that you are pregnant, or your spouse is pregnant is a priceless moment. You will go through nine months of having another life growing inside of you; getting ready to enter the world and look up to you for guidance and nurturing. Then the child will enter the world not knowing if they are going to a loving, nurturing family; that will help them normally develop with the stability that they need or grow up in a family that is dysfunctional and has no stability. The child may become withdrawn, depressed and unmotivated within their life and grow up with no direction leading to drug use or worse death. The question at hand is how can assessing depression in children early on, save their life?
Relationship between parents and children and the effect of depression on children.
a. Statement of Purpose
i. The purpose of this study is to cut down on the number of suicides that we see amongst children in all grade levels ranging from Third grade to twelfth grade. If we can examine the causes of depression amongst children and develop a plan before hand this may condense down the number of suicides. 
b. The rational for conducting the study
i. Peer pressure ii. Parents iii. Depressive disorder iv. Bullies
v. Self-esteem
c. Your hypotheses and research question
i. RQ: Does Parental financial strain influence childhood depression? ii. Null (H0): Parental financial strain does not influence childhood depression. iii. Research Hypothesis: (H1): Parental financial strain does influence childhood depression. 
d. Methods
i. Participants
1. 30 Children in poverty (ranging from ages 8 – 18)
2. 20 Children who suffer from depression ( ranging from 8- 18)
3. 20 Parents who suffer financially  ii. Procedures
1. Place, a local ad asking parents to bring in children that suffer from depression for an evaluation to see if they qualify to participate.
2. Conduct a survey age appropriate about their parents and their emotional state when it comes to finances. iii. Materials
1. Funds 
2. What will participants receive for assisting
3. Consent forms
4. Staff to administer the survey or test
e. Appropriate statistical test(s) for data analysis
i. Chi-square – Cozby (2009) states, “The chi – square test is used when dealing with nominal scale data. It is used when the data consist of frequencies the number of subjects who fall into each of several categories” (p .340) 
f. Articles
i. Timing of mother and child depression in a longitudinal study of children at risk. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.
This article focuses on the relationship between parents and children and the effect of depression on children. At times, parents do not realize the stress and pressure they are placing on a child and how it may impact them and their emotions. They do not notice how the depressed individual was dealing with role functioning and life circumstances. Constance Hammen, Dorli Burge, and Cheri Adrian from the University of California, Los Angeles did a study on how children reacted with a depressed parent compared to a mother who has a disorder. The subjects were ninety-six children ranging from the age of eight and sixteen; they had sixty women with many different diseases and some with no medical illness.
Reference
Hammen, C., Burge, D., & Adrian, C. (1991). Timing of mother and child depression in a longitudinal study of children at risk. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. doi:10.1037//0022-006X.59.2.341

ii. Depression in children
This piece of writing talks about depression in children and