A child belonging to this group may show one of the following characteristics:

1. Quiet and withdrawn: Refuses to interact with the peer group, friends, family and relatives. Probably due to neglect and abuse has not learnt how to form a trusting relationship with people.
2. Refuses to go to school and kicks up a scene if coaxed to do so.
3. Emotionally dependent on the mother and an irrational fear of separation from her.
4. Finds it difficult to adjust to the school set up. Fearful, anxious and cries a lot in the first few days at school.
5. Conversion syndromes: When stressed, may not talk to anybody, may be frightened of school or refuse to go to school and if forced to go may manifest symptoms of stress such as fits or paralysis of limbs. These complaints disappear once the cause is found and the child is helped to solve the problem.
6. Depression: May cry a lot at the smallest pretext, may not talk to any one, may not take interest in anything, may daydream, may not look at people. Depressed children often do not approach others for help, but given a chance to talk may tell what is bothering them.

7. Restlessness: May be unduly restless and may frequently hurt herself. Then she needs to be taken to a specialist for treatment
8. Anxiety and fear: Perception of danger arouses fear, producing or flight reaction. Stress situations often give rise to both fear and anxiety. The child may become totally withdrawn. Continued irrational fear creates phobia. The child realises his fear is irrational and unrealistic but is unable to dispel it.

Freud gives importance to unconscious conflicts centered around aggressive and sexual drives.

Some other psychologists say that disturbed parent-child relationship or interaction creates feelings of insecurities in a child and leads to develop anxiety reactions.

When children are subjected to frequent disapproval and punishment, they tend to become anxious.

Sometimes, a painful experience may make the child fearful and anxious in a similar situation, for eg., a child who was severely punished by a teacher may develop fear of all teachers.

Phobias are extremely disabling. A phobic thinks of an object or a particular situation, become anxious and manifests physiological reactions like excessive perspiration, rapid breathing, tremor, diarrohea, vomiting, tightness in chest, and dizzy spells. Phobic fears are learnt through some painful encounters or many exposures to some painful situation. Sometimes they are also learnt by seeing a model or imitating others. For instance, if the child's mother is phobic to cockroaches the child too may develop excessive fear of cockroaches.

Sometimes emotional problems are manifested through certain physical symptoms and illnesses.

• A child emotionally disturbed or anxious about something may be assailed by bouts of asthma.

• Bed-wetting/wetting in class: most children stop wetting at night by 3-4 years. Some however might continue to do so for a longer period. If the child does not have any physical problem then she needs to be referred to a doctor and trained in bladder control.

On the other hand, sometimes certain physical problems affect the emotional and mental domains.

• Children with physical handicaps such as blindness, deafness or deformed limbs may feel very sensitive and ashamed of their physical handicaps.

• Epilepsy requires special mention. Each attack of epilepsy affects the ability to learn and memorise. The child should be taken to a neurologist for treatment and given anti-epileptic drugs to control the problem.

This is broadly of two types: psycho therapy and somato therapy (physical methods of treatment). The therapist-client relationship and attitude towards therapy are important factors that affect therapeutic success or failure.

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1. Encourage the child to talk out her problems and try to get at the root cause
2. Remove the cause of the problem if possible
3. Do not pay undue attention to the illness behaviour of the child as this may send a wrong signal that she can get what she wants by feigning illness
4. Teach her better strategies to solve the problem. Discuss with the child the various options in such a situation

What to do with a restless child?

a. Make realistic demands on him. Don't expect him to sit for hours and study.

b. Encourage any possible talent in the child

c. Help the child to have a regular life with few distractions. Help maintain a regular routine, doing the same activities at the same time everyday, such as, getting up, going to school, playing and studying. This will give the child a sense of security and calm her down.

5. Don't give in when the child makes unreasonable demands.

a. Do not give any liquid food later than 6 o'clock in the evening.

c. During holidays encourage the child

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