Factors Influencing Headache in Children

Hong, Yeon Ran

Abstract

OBJECTIVES: This descriptive study was conducted to examine the degree of stress, coping styles, communication with the mother and depression between headache-suffering children and headache-free children and to explore predicted factors for headache occurrence in children. METHOD: The subjects of this study consisted of 196 headache-free children and 107 headache-suffering children. They were 4th-6th graders of an elementary school in T city. The instruments in this study were David's stressor of children, Lazarus & Folkman's Stress Coping Style, PACI (Parent-Adolescent Communication Inventory) by Barnes & Olsen and Kovac's CDI (Children's depression inventory). Data were collected from May 2 to July 16, 2004. RESULTS: Total stress(t=-3.76, p=.035), school stress(t=-3.02, p=.001), mass media stress(t=-1.39, p=.029) and depression(t=7.62, p=.001) in headache-suffering children were significantly higher than those of headache-free children. Problem-oriented coping skills (t=1.23, p=.023), and the score of communication with the mother (t=2.32, p=.012) in headache-suffering children were lower than those of headache-free children. Logistic regression analysis (stepwise) showed that the most powerful predictor was stressors in school, followed by depression, stressors in mass media and communication with the mother. CONCLUSIONS: This study revealed that important factors such as the degree of school stress, depression, the degree of mass media stress, communication with the mother and problem-oriented coping skills should be controlled for reducing of headaches in children.