Dr. Archana told the various factors that influence an individual learning process are intelligence level, learning disabilities, attention and concentration level, fear and phobias related to studies, exam anxieties, stress, psychological disorders, home environment, etc. A teacher must know all the factors as every individual have a different influencing factor. After knowing the factors they can guide parents or send children to a clinical psychologist for proper diagnosis and treatment of their children. According to clinical psychologist, Early diagnosis, early recognition and timely intervention of these factors can help a student to improve his/her performance in school and in learning. It can reduce the chances of any mental illness in child and adolescent. There are some psychological tests too which can be administered or used for proper diagnosis of these problems.

Let’s understand different learning styles:

1. Visual (Spatial)
2. Auditory (Aural)
3. Linguistic (Verbal)
4. Social (Interpersonal
5. Solitary (Intrapersonal)
6. Physical (kinesthetic)

Visual learners are those who prefer to study or collect data through images, pictures, maps and graphics.

Aural or auditory learners are those who can assess information through listening and speaking.  They have nice memory for conversations and enjoy debates and discussions.

Verbal learners are good at collecting information through words. They are excellent in reading, writing, and speaking. They can learn many languages.

Social learner is one who learns through interaction with others. They are good at communication and can read other’s emotion very well.

Intrapersonal learner is one who enjoys his own company and likes to do self study. They are self motivator and self managed people.

Physical learners are totally different from others. They are the one who learn when movements of their body parts are included while learning e.g. walking while reading.

It is not necessary that only one individual will follow only one learning style. They can have more than one learning style like a good verbal learner can be an excellent aural learner too. Thus, it is important for a parent to know learning pattern of their child so that they can help them in capturing opportunities.

A parent can also get to know the learning disabilities and behavior of a child with certain psychometric evaluation techniques, IQ test and learning disabilities test used by clinical psychologist.

Some examples of mental disorders that are diagnosed during childhood include attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), oppositional defiant disorder (ODD). Mental disorders that occur during either childhood or adulthood include anxiety disorders such as social phobia and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD); and mood disorders such as depression.

A clinical psychiatrist is a medical doctor who can diagnose mental illnesses and write prescriptions for medication. Often, the two will work together to provide a combination of counseling and medication.

Along with medications, psychological treatments or psychotherapy are used in treating the patient.

Types of Psychotherapy are:

Art Therapy

It’s a non threatening form of healing where children draw a story of their life events and conditions that they are struggling to tell feelings. Art therapy is used to treat ADHD, anxiety, depression. After that therapists study the drawing and according to color scheme what child has used help him to make an inference about the mental condition. He/ she then try to discuss with child.

Play Therapy

The technique is used to treat the child of age 3 to 14. Play therapy is used to treat mental disorders such ODD, ADHD, anxiety, and depression. It also involves a non-threatening form of communication in which toys represent words. As the name indicates, play therapy, it involves playing. Children engage in storytelling followed by identifying the feelings of characters in the story; role-playing with puppets as a form of feeling projection; and blowing bubbles to improve deep and controlled breathing. The therapist observes feelings and disturbing behavior.

Parent Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT)

It helps parents and children who struggle with behavior problems or connection through real-time coaching sessions. Parents interact with their children while therapists guide families toward positive interactions.

Applied Behavior Analysis

Children with more severe mental challenges are treated with operant conditioning. This involves reinforcing a desired behavior in increments through cognitive-behavioral techniques.

It is very important to diagnose the problem in children and provide healing facility to them because if a child does not receive necessary care, the illness may continue into adulthood, creating high risk and issues.

Disclaimer: This content including advice provides generic information only. It is in no way a substitute for qualified medical opinion. Always consult a specialist or your own doctor for more information. Jugaadin News does not claim responsibility for this information.

A career counselor could be a helping hand, volunteer, guide and therapist, who will provide career information, career development tips, can interpret aptitude and abilities of the person. A wide variety of areas are there before a person while deciding on a career.  He might not be able to get or collect information on each and every area. That’ when counseling plays an important part. Counseling helps in assessing one’s ability, interests, skills, need and desires and provides them valuable information on the areas and according to their need.

In career counseling session, clinical psychologists use certain psychological assessment tests, IQ test and aptitude test to determine the interest, kind of personality and skills of a child. There are some common topics that a counselor may discuss during career counseling session can be:

• Skills and talent required for a career
• Potential earnings of various careers
• Working style of the individual.
• Educational requirement of the careers. How much efforts one has to put while going for a certain path.

The therapist or clinical psychologist helps identify resources, financial aid resources and ways to manage stress.

The fear, worry and discomfort of an individual in public, social function is a mental health disorder termed as Social Anxiety disorder. A person suffering from social anxiety disorder may feel embarrassment in social situations. He is fearful of being scrutinized by others while meeting them. This is also called as Social phobia.

The symptoms of Social anxiety disorder are many and can be differentiate into behavioral, physical and emotional.

Physical signs include:

Avoiding eye contact

Confused

Nervous

High Heart Beat

Shaking voice and trembling hands

Excessive sweating

Mental tension, walking disturbance, cold hands etc are physical symptoms.

Emotional Signs include:

Fear of talking and sitting with strangers

Extreme concerned about their looks when in society

Try to avoid those conditions where they can be center of attraction

Panic attacks when face hostile situations

Blank mind during communicating with others

Fear of going in a room which is full of people

The people suffering from social anxiety disorder are over sensitive, have low self esteem and generally talk negative about them. The causes of social anxiety can be many like genetic, physical and past experiences and are different in different individuals that can only be diagnosed rightly by the clinical psychologist or psychiatrist. Social anxiety disorder is a lifelong condition. Treatments like psychotherapy and medications can help people control their symptoms and gain confidence.

Reasons:

Behind the mental illness of children, three main reasons can be there: physical, mental and social. Physical factors include heredity and chances of other family members to have the same problem. Mental factors include what child thinks about him, or about a certain situation. Social factors are those factors and conditions in which child has grown.

The main reason for depression in children are- unnecessary expectations from parents, differences between parents and their separation, pressure to bring the maximum marks, change in schools due to job, abused by peer groups etc. There are many children who have lack of self confidence, they keep on thinking about their looks, weight, height and figure. Their friends keep joking on them for their poor performance and bad looks which make them depressed. They are unable to share the feeling with anyone and parent are not able to understand the condition, that’s why psychiatrists say that parent need to keep in mind that symptoms of depression can vary in small and young children. If parent are not cautious about their children’s behavior, they do not pay attention to their points and problems, then this can have serious consequences.

How counseling helps?

If parent came to know that his child is suffering from the depression, they should follow him for some days. They should look for the changes in him. For more information they can contact their friends and ask teachers for any notable change. It is also possible that children can’t talk to their parent freely on this topic, that’s why they should consult psychiatrist. According to Psychiatrists, counseling is not necessary only for the children, parent also require same level of session. Sometime, session can be taken with both child and parent together but prior to that permission should be taken from the child, if he is comfortable in front of them.

Clinical psychiatrists say that presence of parent is necessary during the treatment of the child as sometime parent are unaware of the problem.  The depression is dwelling in our children’s mind and thus it is necessary that parent should not be strict with them, don’t crush their ambitions, should pay attention on them, congratulate them on their victory, indulge them in important discussions, increase their confidence , don’t compare with them to others. If possible, take the help of counselors who deal in mental health issues.

Do they wash and clean their hands frequently?

Do they keep on checking their things?

If people in your family, friends and surroundings who have these kind of characterstics, they must be suffering from OCD. OCD (Obsessive-compulsive disorder) is a mental health issue charactersized by repetitive and compulsive physical and mental actions. Like keeping hands clean by washing again and again, keeping utensils in a particular manner, checking the rooms, taps and other things continuously and fear of getting contamination. According to a report of World Health Organization (WHO), OCD is the fourth most common mental health issue.

There can be many types of OCD but some common forms are:

Checking:  As the name indicates, checking is associated with obsession of preventing damage or any harm. The person with OCD keep on checking the doors, windows, knobs, locks, past memories, taps.

Contamination: Contamination is fear of getting dirty, thus people who are obsessed with avoiding the contact with public toilets, hospitals, crowd, money, clothes and keep on washing hands again and again.

Hoarding: Hoarding is the possessiveness or obsession of keeping useless and worn out things.

Rumination: it involves the deep thinking on intrusive thoughts. They focus on what is not real. Like what will happen after death and how is the heaven and hell look like. All these are the philosophical and unrealistic thoughts that occur in the person’ mind. This makes them aloof and solitary in nature.

Intrusive Thoughts: These are the thoughts which make a person violent and distress. The person gets obsessed of killing self or loved ones, and superstitions.

Symmetry: It means to keep the things in order. Person is obsessed of keeping utensils, books, shoes, and certain things in a particular manner to avoid any discomfort.

The causes of OCD can be genetic, neurological, biological, cognitive and environmental. The disorder is not a condition that can be resolved by its own. Thus, if we see any such symptoms in our loved ones, we should take them to the specialist and provide them the best therapy required as early as possible.