World Children's Day. What it means to actually hear a child.

In my clinic in Vienna, I ask children what they think is happening. Not the parents — the children. In most clinical settings, this is unusual. The adult brings the child; the adult explains the problem; the clinician addresses the adult. The child is present but not consulted. What I find, when I ask the child directly, is almost always useful information that the adult's account did not contain.

The child's account is not always accurate. It is not always complete. But it contains something that the adult's account does not: the child's experience of what is happening. And the child's experience of what is happening is, in most cases, directly relevant to the clinical picture. The anxiety that the parent describes as 'coming from nowhere' is often, from the child's perspective, coming from a very specific somewhere that they have not been asked about.

In my clinic in Vienna, I ask children what they think is happening. Not the parents — the children. In most clinical settings this is unusual. The adult brings the child; the adult explains the problem; the clinician addresses the adult. What I find, when I ask the child directly, is almost always useful information that the adult's account did not contain.