Informant discrepancies in adolescent anxiety assessment: The roles of adolescent depression and school avoidance.
Abstract
When assessing adolescent psychopathology, discrepancies in adolescent self-report versus caregiver informant-report scores on symptom measures are typical. As anxiety is the most common mental health concern among adolescents, understanding variables associated with adolescent-caregiver informant discrepancies on anxiety measures is valuable for assessment and treatment planning. However, although anxiety often co-occurs with other problems, no existing work has examined how other common emotional/behavioral problems (i.e., depression, school avoidance) among adolescents moderate the magnitude of adolescent-caregiver score discrepancies on anxiety measures. The present study used latent difference score modeling within a sample of adolescent-caregiver dyads recruited from an adolescent partial hospitalization program (N = 328, 47.81% female, 46.06% White; N = 145-204 for primary analyses) to examine whether adolescent depression, school avoidance, and adolescent-caregiver (dis)agreement on top problems for treatment moderate adolescent-caregiver score discrepancies on anxiety scales. Results suggest adolescents and caregivers provide similar scores for adolescents' anxiety symptoms. However, adolescents who self-report higher levels of depression and school avoidance behavior may self-report higher panic/somatic symptom levels and generalized anxiety levels than their caregivers attribute to them. Adolescent-caregiver agreement on top problems for treatment was not associated with adolescent-caregiver agreement on anxiety scale scores. Carefully assessing experiences of somatic and worry-related symptoms may be beneficial for adolescents presenting with depression and/or school avoidance. Moreover, identifying reasons why adolescents and caregivers provide similar anxiety scale scores but vary in endorsing anxiety as a top problem for treatment or vice versa would aid in further understanding adolescent-caregiver informant discrepancies. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).