Adolescent problem-solving thinking.

Tested the hypothesis that adolescent psychiatric patients would be deficient with respect to normal controls in their interpersonal problem-solving skills by comparing 33 patients and 53 high school student controls on 7 tasks reflecting different aspects of problem solving. With IQ covaried out, controls obtained significantly higher scores on the tasks evaluating optional thinking, social means-ends thinking, and role taking, but not on the tasks measuring problem recognition, causal thinking, emotional means-ends thinking, and consequential thinking. Findings are interpreted within a developmental framework of interpersonal problem-solving thinking. (27 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)