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Reflective Paper Conduct Disorder
Conduct disorder concerns a pattern of negative behavior in
childhood and adolescence. Conduct disorder affects approximately 1%
to 3% of the population of children under 18. Some of the qualities
needed to make the official diagnosis can be hard to define. Some
children are defiant and break rules but do not necessarily have this
disorder. To have conduct disorder the child's behavior must be
extreme and ongoing not just getting in trouble now and then. The
diagnosis is three times more common among boys than girls. Symptoms
of conduct disorder include defiance, impulsive behavior, drug use,
ongoing criminal activity and violence. Some professionals believe
that there is a hereditary element to conduct disorder. Most
professionals agree that issues in a child's home life affects this
disorder a great deal more. Conduct disorder has been associated with
child abuse, drug addiction, alcoholism, serious family conflict, and
poverty. Conduct disorder can also be an early sign of depression or
bipolar disorder. Some of the earliest symptoms of conduct disorder
can be seen in children as young as three. Early symptoms of conduct
disorder include breaking the rules without obvious reasons, cruel or
aggressive behavior towards animals and then people, intentionally
setting fires, lying, running away and vandalizing or destroying
property. As children get older if not treated their symptoms become
very serious and start to involve the police authorities. The cruel
and aggressive behavior towards people and animals include bullying,
fighting, dangerous weapons, forced sexual activity and ongoing theft.
If a child still has not received help by the time they're in their
teenage years heavy drinking and heavy drug use are a real
possibility. These children often make no effort to hide their
aggressive behaviors. They have a difficult time making any meaningful
friends. They rarely attend school and get in trouble with the law.
There is no test for diagnosing conduct disorder, a diagnosis can be
made if a child has a history of conduct disorder behaviors. Treatment
can start as early as three years old. For treatment to be successful
the child's family needs to be involved. If a child has been abused
the child may need to be removed from the family and placed in a home
where this will not happen again. Conduct disorder patients receive
anti-anxiety medicines and later in life anti-aggression medicines to
help control their negative behaviors. There are many resources to
help children with their conduct disorder diagnosis. The best place to
start is with your school counselor. Here at Bainbridge Island high
school we have a full-time counselor to help children deal with these
types of problems. Children often get great results with group therapy
and psychotherapy as well. With medication and therapy children can
get better over time. If conduct disorder is not handled it can lead
to many tragic results including drug and alcohol abuse, violence or
even jail. Children with conduct disorder may go on to develop
antisocial personality disorder as young adults if they do not begin
treatment. If I had to do this project over again I would like to
figure out how to make animation in the presentation. There were a few
really good anti-bullying messages that had animation that I would've
loved to have used but I did not know how to put them into the
presentation format in Google.
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