A positive approach to children's internalizing problems

Increasing numbers of children are presenting with internalizing symptoms, and psychologists need effective and efficient ways of assessing and intervening with these problems, most typically anxiety and depression. The author discusses a positive, strength-based approach to internalizing disorders with an emphasis on the role of positive affect in differential diagnosis and intervention. This framework describes how positive affect, life satisfaction, and strengths may be measured and how such measurement may be integrated into the overall assessment. A positive framework is also applied to intervention, both in terms of current empirically validated interventions for children's internalizing disorders and in consideration of new intervention applications based on recent work with adults and youth.