Kingdom

Evidence for the longitudinal associations between internalising symptom development and academic attainment is sparse and results from existing studies are largely inconclusive. The approaches that have been used in existing studies examining this relationship have in common the limitation of grouping together all individuals in the sample which makes the as-sumption that the relationship between time, symptoms and attainment across all individu-als is the same. The current study aimed to use heterogeneous trajectories of symptom development to examine the longitudinal associations between internalising symptom de-velopment and change in academic attainment over a three years period in early adoles-cence, a key period for internalising symptom development. Internalising symptoms were assessed for 3 consecutive years in a cohort from age 11–14 years (n = 2647, mean age at T1 = 11.7 years). National standardised test scores prior to the first wave and subsequent to the last wave were used as measures of academic attainment. Heterogeneous symptom development trajectories were identified using latent class growth analysis and socio-demo-graphic correlates, such as gender, SES and ethnicity, of the different trajectory grouping