Summary
This study suggests that nonattendance at school (school phobia) is not a clinical entity, a neurotic condition, but that it sometimes has definite features of various psychiatric disorders. After surveying the statistical, follow-up, and diagnostic approaches to this problem in Japan, we developed an overall picture of the psychopathology of school phobia in children and adolescents. Once students have been absent from school for any one of various reasons, they become afraid that classmates will ask them why they were absent. They develop specific “feelings of behindness,” which means that there is a feeling of guilt by the student. Such feelings about not attending school develop into a chronic state, manifested by various neurotic disorders: separation anxiety disorder, panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and social phobia, when these conditions are prolonged, the problems extend to family situations and finally to the state of the ego. The features of this stage are schizoid personality and borderline personality disorder. With the former, there is still a chance of readapting to school life, and such students can terminate their period of “school refusal.” In some of the adolescents who have a school phobia, however, schizophrenic symptoms develop after some time.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Takagi R, Kawabata T, Tamura S, et al (1959) Psychiatric survey of long absentees from obligation of school attendance (in Japanese). Clin Psychiatry 1:403–409
Takagi R (1963) Mental mechanism of school phobia and its prevention. Acta Paedopsychiatr 30:135–140
Takagi R, Kawabata T, Fujisawa A, Kato N (1965) Nuclear type of school phobia. 1. Symptom formation (in Japanese with English abstract). Jpn J Child Psychiatry 6:157–165
Furukawa, H, Hishiyama Y (1980) A statistical study of the refusal to attend school. 1. Social factors and the change in the incidence rate in Tokyo (in Japanese with English abstract). Jpn J Child Adolesc Psychiatry 21:300–309
Hishiyama Y, Furukawa H (1982) A statistical study of the refusal to attend school. 2. Socical factors and the change in the incidence rate in Japan (in Japanese with English abstract). Jpn J Child Adolesc Psychiatry 23:183–191
Wakabayashi S, Kaneko T, Saburi M, et al (1982) The relationship between school refusal and social conditions in Japan (in Japanese with English abstract). Jpn J Child Adolesc Psychiatry 23:160–180
Honjo S, Kaneko T, Wakabayashi S, et al (1987) The actual conditions of patients who refuse to go to school: change from 1972–74 to 1982–84 (in Japanese with English abstract). Jpn J Child Adolesc Psychiatry 20:33–35
Ministry of Education (1994) Report of a survey of fundamental school education problems (in Japanese). Yomiuri Shimbun 1994 August 13
Fukuma H, Inoue E, Namine T, et al (1980) Long-term follow-up of school phobic children and adolescents (in Japanese). Clin Psychiatry 22:401–408
Umezawa Y (1984) School refusal and modern society, from the follow-up study of residential treatment in Japan (in Japanese). Jpn J Child Adolesc Psychiatry 25:85–89
Ohtaka K, Wakabayashi S, Enomoto K, et al (1986) A long-term follow-up study of school refusal children (in Japanese with English abstract). Jpn J Child Adolesc Psychiatry 27:213–219
Yamamoto Y (1964) Über die Pathogenese der sogenanten Schulphobie (in Japanese with German abstract). Psychiatr Neurol Jpn 66:558–583 (abstract on pp 38–39)
Minakawa K, Nakane A, Miyake Y, et al (1989) Inquiry on clinical diagnosis of school refusal. Jpn J Psychiatry Neurol 43:311
Yamazaki K, Kurita H, Minakawa K, et al (1989) Study of diagnostic classification of child and adolescent psychiatric disorders. 2. Report of a national research project concerning the genesis of and treatment for child and adolescent psychiatric disorders 1988 (in Japanese). National Center of Psychiatry and Neurology, pp 79–92
Yamazaki K, Kurita H, Minakawa K, et al (1990) Study of diagnostic classification of child and adolescent psychiatric disorders. 3. Report of a national research project concerning the genesis of and treatment for child and adolescent psychiatric disorders 1989 (in Japanese). National Center of Psychiatry and Neurology, pp 75–87
Berg I (1980) School refusal in early adolescence. In: Hersov L, Berg I (eds) Out of school: modern perspective in truancy and school refusal. Wiley New York, pp 231–249
Nakane A, Kato H, Hara K, et al (1991) School refusal, its relation to schizophrenia and mood disorders (in Japanese). Jpn J Psychiatr Treat 6:1173–1179
Nakane A (1990) School refusal: psychopathology and natural history. In: Chiland C, Young G (eds) Why children reject school: view from seven countries. Yale University Press, New Haven, pp 62–72
Miike T, Tomoda A (1994) Death by overwork in school: what happened in the body in the state of non-attending school children (in Japanese). Shindan To Chiryo Sha, Tokyo
Deshimaru M, Ishizuka K, Tsuji Y, Miyakawa T (1994) Panic disorder in puberal cases with school refusal (in Japanese). Clin Psychiatry 35:241–248
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1996 Springer-Verlag Tokyo
About this paper
Cite this paper
Nakane, A. (1996). Nonattendance at School (School Phobia): Clinical Aspects and Psychopathology. In: Shimizu, M. (eds) Recent Progress in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. Springer, Tokyo. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-68525-8_7
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-68525-8_7
Publisher Name: Springer, Tokyo
Print ISBN: 978-4-431-70172-9
Online ISBN: 978-4-431-68525-8
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive