School refusal

Abstract

While most children and adolescents attend school regularly and without difficulty, there is a sizable group of young people who experience what can be regarded as a school attendance problem. Kearney (2003) proposed a distinction between nonproblematic and problematic absenteeism, whereby young people with problematic absenteeism were defined as those who: "(a) have missed most (i.e., >50%) school time for at least 2 weeks and/or (b) experience difficulty attending school for at least 2 weeks such that significant interference occurs in the child's or the family's daily life routine" (p. 59). Further, with respect to point (a), the absences are not due to factors which parents and school officials regard as legitimate, such as illness or arrangements for home schooling. Even though the definition includes a nonspecific criteria (i.e., significant interference in daily life), it goes a long way towards helping to bring much needed consensus to the important field of school attendance problems. © 2006 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.