Children\u27s responses to medically induced discrete, acute pain

Three experiments were carried out with children in a private office on the measurement of distress caused by allergy treatment injections and on a behavioral technique to alleviate this treatment-induced distress. In Experiment 1 a rating scale to measure observable indices of distress with children receiving injections was developed and its construct validity and reliability determined. In Experiment 2, norms were derived for the sample of children studied and the nature of the expression of distress according to age and sex was examined. In Experiment 3 two treatments for alleviating the treatment-induced distress, (a) sensory information, and (b) systematic reinforcement of non-distress behaviors, were presented to the nurses and parents via written materials and tested. The results from the test of the two Interventions indicated that the interventions were not being implemented and could, therefore, not be evaluated properly. The study was, however, successful in developing and validating a medical distress measurement instrument and in obtaining normative data on children\u27s expression of distress during the injections. The normative data indicated the existence of clear age differences but a lack of sex differences in the children\u27s expression of distress