HEALTH ANXIETY IN CHILDREN AS A NEW DIRECTION OF RESEARCH IN THE FIELD OF HEALTH PSYCHOLOGY

The article deals with the problem of health anxiety in children research as a new and relevant direction in the health psychology field. Researches on this problem inevitably face methodological difficulties related to the definition of this concept and the psychological tools for its study; the available theoretical and empirical data require detailed consideration and clarification. There is a question of separating the concepts of «personal anxiety» and «health anxiety» and defining the relationship features and mutual influence between these concepts. Health anxiety is a complex and multidimensional concept, which is a set of experiences, emotional health representations, located on a continuum from non-clinical forms of moderate concern about health to clinical hypochondriac states. The formation of health anxiety in childhood is influenced by a large number of factors, among which a significant place is occupied by health anxiety in parents, as well as the child's personal illness experience. The purpose of this research was to study the relationship between personal anxiety and health anxiety in children, taking into account the parents' influence and depending on the child's personal illness experience. The results of an empirical study allow us to conclude that health anxiety in children is a separate construct, and its indicators do not depend on indicators of personal anxiety. Based on the findings, the relationship between the personal anxiety indicators and health anxiety in children and their parents is shown; conclusions about the severity of the considered characteristics in children who are frequently and rarely ill are made.