Table 1 Capacities of children according to studies
From: Child’s assent in research: Age threshold or personalisation?
Author | Year | Number of subjects | Age | Question posed to children (example) | Conclusion |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Weithorn L, Campbell SB | 1982 | 96 | 9-21 | “What happens if a person is taking insulin and misses one injection?” | “Children as young as 9 appear able to participate meaningfully in personal health-care decision making”. |
Abramovitch R et al. | 1991 | 163 | 5-21 | “Should you be in a study if you didn’t like it and your mother did?” | “If the instructions are given clearly and the study is not excessively complex, most children as young as 5 are capable of understanding what they will be doing and therefore have the capacity to give their assent or dissent to the research”. |
Susman EJ et al. | 1992 | 44 | 7-20 | “What are the side effects of taking your treatment?” | “Although we found no age differences, developmental differences do exist among children, adolescents, and adults […]. Adolescents and young adults were no better than children in comprehending abstract concepts”. |
Ondrusek N et al. | 1998 | 18 | 5-18 | “What good things might happen to other people because you are in this study?” | “In subjects younger than 9 years of age, understanding of most aspects of the study was found to be poor to non-existent”. |
Miller S | 2000 | 6 | 7-12 | “The children were […] asked to talk about their likes and dislikes”. | Researchers should not “underestimate the awareness and maturity that some children possess when addressing issues of concern to themselves”. |
Geller G et al. | 2003 | 37 dyads of parents and children | 10-17 with parents | No information regarding questions posed. | “Most children wanted or expected some degree of parental input, but still thought the final decision should be theirs”. |
Burke TM et al. | 2005 | 251 | 6-13 | “Can you think of any good things about being in the study?” | “By creating age appropriate modules of information, children as young as six years can understand potentially difficult and complex concepts […] associated with participation in biomedical research”. |