Communication Patterns in Medical Encounters for the Treatment of Child Psychosocial Problems: Does Pediatrician–Parent Concordance Matter?

Abstract

This study examined how pediatrician–parent social status concordance related to communication patterns in medical encounters during which children received treatment for psychosocial problems indicating attention deficit disorder or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Using data from 28 pediatric medical encounters occurring in a large southeastern metropolitan city during 2003, we focused on concordance according to race, gender, and education, and its relation to laughter, concern, self-disclosure, question asking, and information-giving utterances, and patient-centeredness. Results indicated that race-concordant pediatricians and parents frequently laughed, whereas parents asked many biomedical questions in gender-concordant encounters. Education-concordant pediatricians and parents expressed concern repeatedly, exchanged biomedical information freely, and shared communication control. Pediatricians also self-disclosed when interacting with college-educated parents.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This research was supported by Minority Research Supplement R01MH062951-03S1, awarded to the first author by the National Institute of Mental Health.

We thank Dr. Catherine Smith for her help with data collection, coding, and cleaning, and Deanne Casanova, Cathy Koerber, and Mary Griffin for their administrative support.