Page 5989 - Week 18 - Thursday, 12 December 1991
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world and managing its complexities make a child feel supported. As a consequence, they raise the child's self-esteem and diminish possibilities of the child becoming depressed, leading on to all sorts of other problems, and possibly ending up with behavioural disturbance.
There is a wide range of behavioural problems evident among young people in the ACT. Research has shown that behavioural disturbance can be in one of two forms. The first is the externalised type, which is probably the type most of us can clearly identify and includes things such as anger and defiance. The other is the internalised form, which is apathy or withdrawal. Some of that behaviour is identified in the committee's report. It includes violence against family members, peers and those seen as authority figures; depression; inability to maintain friendships; lack of concentration; lack of social skills; petty crime; emotional disturbance; truancy; antisocial behaviour; alcohol abuse; drug abuse; uncontrollable acting out; defiance of authority; and extreme withdrawal.
Most of the behaviours I have listed are of the externalised type and they cause significantly more disruption than the internalised type and on the surface are more difficult to deal with. Internalised behavioural disturbance is largely exhibited by girls, or so the evidence indicates, and their needs are largely being overlooked.
There are many causes of behavioural disturbance in the young, some of which are known and some of which are not known. Research, both in Australia and overseas, shows that there are biological, psychological, family and cultural influences that are related to or may contribute towards behavioural disturbance. Therefore, each case needs careful consideration. Specific behaviour disorders such as hyperactivity, distractability and childhood psychosis are suspected to have a biological base. Brain damage or dysfunction, evident either at birth or as a result of an accident or illness later on, can often cause or contribute to behavioural disturbance. For the most part, the great majority of these instances really do happen at a very young age.
Intellectual disability is also often related to behavioural disturbance and there is also some relationship between gender and behavioural disturbance, as I mentioned a little earlier. At the psychological level, it has been found that those of school age have higher frequencies of mental retardation and attention deficient disorder, with or without hyperactivity, when compared with rates for non-school-age children. In the field of mental health, it is generally agreed that abnormal patterns of behaviour, as well as any emotional problems established early in life, are very difficult to reverse in adulthood. I think that is a very important point. It is very difficult to reverse those problems established early in life. They must be identified early, rather than trying to change them later.
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