Cross-cultural child and adolescent psychiatry research in developing countries

Abstract

Mental disorders are currently a major source of morbidity among children and youth globally. The bulk of the epidemiological data about childhood mental health morbidity currently comes from the industrialized countries which paradoxically host a small (about 20%) proportion of global children and youth population. As the world seek to generate more data on the mental health of the teeming children and youth population in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), cross-cultural issues need be considered. This consideration is imperative for reasons which include the high level of ethno-diversity in LMICs; the contextual issues in the conceptualization of normal (and abnormal) childhood across cultures, the cross-cultural nuances in risk and protective factors, and the plurality of nature and expression of childhood psychopathology. As much as it is imperative to do so, advancing cross-cultural child and adolescent research in LMICs will need to overcome challenges such as inclusive sampling and cultural validation of instruments developed in the industrialized countries of the West. Funding, technical resources, and publication bias are other potential challenges. These issues are appraised in this narrative review and some ways forward are proffered.