The Children Depression Inventory (CDI) is a multidimensional instrument that includes items of social withdrawal, anhedonia, asthenia, low self-esteem (internalized) and behavioral problems (externalized). Child depression has been related with low academic achievement, neurotic and introverted personality traits and social maladjustment defined by aggressiveness, psychoticism and antisocial behavior. In this work, it is hypothesized that in non-clinical populations, the relationships between CDI scores and a low academic achievement might be basically due to social maladjustment assessed by the behavioral items of this instrument, which do not necessarily tap depressive mood. The effects of both depressive mood and social maladjustment on academic achievement are analyzed in an adolescent sample of 315 boys and 363 girls through Structural Equation Modelling procedures. Results corroborate the hypothesis that social maladjustment measured by the CDI behavioral items and Psychoticism explain low academic achievement over and above depressive mood measured by the rest of the CDI items, extraversion and neuroticism. (Contains 1 figure and 4 tables.)