The Most Common Psychological & Behavioral Problems
As stated on our facts and statistics page, mental, emotional, or behavioral problems in children are quite common, impacting anywhere from 15 to 33% of all youth, depending on the study. Here is a further breakdown of the prevalence of various disorders:
A) According to the Surgeon General’s Report on Mental Health, the percentage of children ages 9-17 who have these behavioral and mental disorders is…
- Anxiety disorder: 13% 2
- Disruptive disorder: 10%
- Mood disorder: 6%
- ADHD: 4% (Elias, 11-20-2008)
B) According to the CDC, the prevalence of various childhood mental disorders (ages 3 to 17) by type of disorder is as follows:
- Specific phobia: 19.3% 2
- Social phobia: 9.1%
- ADHD: 8.4%
- Separation anxiety: 7.6%
- PTSD: 5.0%
- Illicit drug use disorder: 4.7%
- Anxiety: 4.7%
- Behavioral or conduct problems: 4.6%
- Alcohol use disorder: 4.2% 1
- Depression: 3.9%
- Bipolar 1 or 2 disorder: 2.9%
- Cigarette dependence: 2.8%
- Agoraphobia: 2.4%
- Panic disorder: 2.3%
- Generalized anxiety disorder: 2.2%
- Autism spectrum disorder: 1.8%
- Autism: 1.1%
- Tourette syndrome: 0.3% (Bialik, 2013)