We review evidence on a group recently identified as “at risk,” that is, youth in upwardly mobile, upper-middle class community contexts. These youngsters are statistically more likely than normative samples to show serious disturbance across several domains including drug and alcohol use, as well as internalizing and externalizing problems. Extant data on these problems are reviewed with attention to gender-specific patterns, presenting quantitative developmental research findings along with relevant evidence across other disciplines. In considering possible reasons for elevated maladjustment, we appraise multiple pathways, including aspects of family dynamics, peer norms, pressures at schools, and policies in higher education. All of these pathways are considered within the context of broad, exosystemic mores: the pervasive emphasis, in contemporary American culture, on maximizing personal status, and how this can threaten the well-being of individuals and of communities. We then discuss issues that warrant attention in future research. The paper concludes with suggestions for interventions at multiple levels, targeting youth, parents, educators, as well as policymakers, toward reducing pressures and maximizing positive adaptation among “privileged but pressured” youth and their families.

The field of developmental psychopathology has seen growth in research focusing on interdisciplinarity and normative developmental processes, including context-linked coping and adaptations. However, there continues to be an uncomfortable and unarticulated perspective to view others as having culture and “the self” as representing the standard. A call for explicit cultural considerations in research is needed to augment the impact of these new and other significant conceptual contributions noted. Sociopolitical influences on social contexts relevant to the different trajectories associated with youths' opportunities and challenges are presented. We focus on macrolevel factors that frame contexts in which individual development occurs. A federal and educational policy is used to illustrate how unexamined cultural traditions and patterns embedded in research and policy impact development. These examples provide insight in presenting issues of vulnerability, particularly for youth, and afford opportunities to present advances and challenges paralleled in the developmental psychopathology field.

The last 25 years have seen significant advances in our conceptualization of alcohol use and alcohol use disorders within a developmental framework, along with advances in our empirical understanding that have been potentiated by advances in quantitative methods. These include advances in understanding the heterogeneity of trajectories of alcohol outcomes; new insights about early childhood antecedents, and adolescence and emerging adulthood as important developmental periods for alcohol outcomes; a more nuanced understanding of the influences of developmental transitions, and their timing and contexts; a greater appreciation for the importance of considering multiple levels of analysis (including an increasing number of genetically informative studies); a continuing focus on studying multiple pathways underlying alcohol outcomes; and an increasing focus on studying the effects of alcohol exposure on future development. The current paper reviews these advances and suggests directions for future study.

Psychotic disorders continue to be among the most disabling and scientifically challenging of all mental illnesses. Accumulating research findings suggest that the etiologic processes underlying the development of these disorders are more complex than had previously been assumed. At the same time, this complexity has revealed a wider range of potential options for preventive intervention, both psychosocial and biological. In part, these opportunities result from our increased understanding of the dynamic and multifaceted nature of the neurodevelopmental mechanisms involved in the disease process, as well as the evidence that many of these entail processes that are malleable. In this article, we review the burgeoning research literature on the prodrome to psychosis, based on studies of individuals who meet clinical high risk criteria. This literature has examined a range of factors, including cognitive, genetic, psychosocial, and neurobiological. We then turn to a discussion of some contemporary models of the etiology of psychosis that emphasize the prodromal period. These models encompass the origins of vulnerability in fetal development, as well as postnatal stress, the immune response, and neuromaturational processes in adolescent brain development that appear to go awry during the prodrome to psychosis. Then, informed by these neurodevelopmental models of etiology, we turn to the application of new research paradigms that will address critical issues in future investigations. It is expected that these studies will play a major role in setting the stage for clinical trials aimed at preventive intervention.

It is well established that child maltreatment has significant deleterious effects for the individual as well as for society. We briefly review research regarding the impact of child maltreatment on the attachment relationship, highlighting the need for relational interventions for maltreated children and their families to effectively thwart negative developmental cascades that are so often observed in the context of child maltreatment. Next, historical and contemporaneous perspectives on relational interventions for individuals with histories of child maltreatment are discussed, with attention to the empirical evidence for and the current evidence-based status of several relationally based interventions for child maltreatment. Differential sensitivity to the environment is then discussed as a theoretical framework with important implications for interventions for individuals who have been reared in maltreating environments. Current research on neurobiology and maltreatment is then reviewed, with an emphasis on the need for future investigations on genetic variants, epigenetics, and the efficacy of relational interventions for maltreated children. We conclude with a discussion of the tenets of developmental psychopathology, their implications for relational interventions for child maltreatment, and recommendations for advancing the development, provision, and evaluation of relational interventions for individuals with histories of child maltreatment.

Many young people who are mistreated by an adult, victimized by bullies, criminally assaulted, or who witness domestic violence react to this violence exposure by developing behavioral, emotional, or learning problems. What is less well known is that adverse experiences like violence exposure can lead to hidden physical alterations inside a child's body, alterations that may have adverse effects on life-long health. We discuss why this is important for the field of developmental psychopathology and for society, and we recommend that stress-biology research and intervention science join forces to tackle the problem. We examine the evidence base in relation to stress-sensitive measures for the body (inflammatory reactions, telomere erosion, epigenetic methylation, and gene expression) and brain (mental disorders, neuroimaging, and neuropsychological testing). We also review promising interventions for families, couples, and children that have been designed to reduce the effects of childhood violence exposure. We invite intervention scientists and stress-biology researchers to collaborate in adding stress-biology measures to randomized clinical trials of interventions intended to reduce effects of violence exposure and other traumas on young people.

Half a century of research and program evaluation has fueled a diverse landscape of early childhood policies and practices that produce a range of positive effects on the life prospects of children who face the burdens of significant adversity. Drawing on advances in neurobiology, developmental psychology, developmental psychopathology, and prevention science, this paper presents a framework for elucidating underlying causal mechanisms that explain differences in outcomes, formulating enhanced theories of change about how to shift developmental trajectories, designing creative interventions and rethinking the concept of a two-generation strategy to produce breakthrough impacts, and launching a new era of investment in young children and their families that will achieve greater reductions in intergenerational disparities in learning, behavior, and health than those produced by current best practices. Particular attention is focused on the hypothesis that substantially better outcomes for vulnerable, young children could be achieved by greater attention to strengthening the resources and capabilities of the adults who care for them rather than by continuing to focus primarily on the provision of child-focused enrichment, parenting education, and informal support. Central to achieving this goal is the need to establish an innovation-friendly environment that embraces fast-cycle sharing, supports risk taking, and celebrates learning from failure.