In this longitudinal study, we examined the relations between emotion knowledge in first grade, teacher reports of internalizing and externalizing behaviors from first grade, and children's self-reported internalizing behaviors in fifth grade. At Time 1, we assessed emotion knowledge, expressive vocabulary, caregiver-reported earned income, and teacher-rated internalizing and externalizing behaviors in 7-year-old children from economically disadvantaged families (N = 154). At Time 2, when the children were age 11, we collected children's self-reports of negative emotions, depression, anxiety, and loneliness. First grade teacher-reported externalizing behaviors, but not first grade internalizing behaviors, were positively related to children's self-reports of internalizing behaviors in fifth grade. First grade emotion knowledge accounted for a significant amount of variance in children's self-reports of internalizing symptoms 4 years later, after controlling for per capita earned income, expressive vocabulary, and teacher-reported internalizing and externalizing behaviors in first grade.

This study investigated the longitudinal impact of maltreatment parameters on personality processes and maladjustment and prospective relationships between personality trajectory classes and subsequent maladjustment outcomes. The sample involved maltreated (n = 249) and nonmaltreated (n = 200) children followed longitudinally between ages 6 and 10. Growth mixture modeling indicated multifinality in personality development depending on the risk status (i.e., maltreated vs. nonmaltreated). Two trajectory classes of ego resiliency were identified for maltreated children: those who showed a declining trajectory exhibited greater maladjustment. In contrast, three trajectory classes of ego control were identified for nonmaltreated children; the subgroups showing increases in ego undercontrol or dramatic changes from high ego undercontrol to high ego overcontrol exhibited poor adjustment. Experiencing multiple maltreatment subtypes and physical/sexual abuse were related to higher levels of ego undercontrol and externalizing symptomatology, whereas early onset of maltreatment was associated with the low and decreasing trajectory of ego resiliency and higher levels of internalizing symptomatology. The findings suggest that ego resiliency and ego control, personality processes related to self-regulation, may be important factors in identifying distinct pathways to later personality disorders as well as pathways to resilient functioning.

Dramatic gains in knowledge have been made in the fields of neuroscience, human development, and developmental psychopathology during the past quarter of a century. Despite the advances that have been achieved in each discipline separately, considerably less progress has occurred in understanding the relation between neurobiological and behavioral development in normal and atypical populations. Research has increasingly demonstrated that abnormalities that occur early in development may result in the emergence of aberrant neural circuitry that eventuates in relatively enduring forms of psychopathology. Knowledge of normal neurobiological development provides a powerful foundation for understanding the contributions that neurodevelopmental processes make to the etiology and sequelae of psychopathology across the life course. An integrated perspective wherein an appreciation of the complex neural, psychological, and social-contextual processes that cohere to bring about normal and pathological outcomes is necessary in order to advance understanding of the genesis and epigenesis of mental disorders. Such an approach will require a reduction of the schisms that so often separate neurobiological and behavioral research.

We examined maternal and paternal characteristics at 1 month postpartum as risk and protective factors for children's internalizing and externalizing problems at 2–3 years of age. In a sample of 70 couples and their children, fathers' depressive symptoms at 1 month postpartum predicted children's internalizing and externalizing problems at 2–3 years of age, and the interaction of fathers' and mothers' depressive symptoms predicted subsequent internalizing problems. Mothers' postpartum symptoms did not predict either type of children's behavior problems at age 2–3. When entered in the regression equations, mothers' depressive symptoms when the children were age 2–3 years accounted for all of the effects of paternal and maternal postpartum depressive symptoms. No evidence was found for the protective effects of marital satisfaction or social support, or for low levels of depressive symptoms in a spouse. We highlight directions for future risk and resilience research related to parental postpartum depression.

The study of brain development and that of behavioral development have historically proceeded independently of one another. This is an unfortunate set of circumstances, given that the disciplines concerned with development—for example, developmental psychology, pediatrics, psychiatry, clinical psychology, and the neurosciences—have much to learn from each other. Drawing on recent advances in the developmental brain and behavioral sciences, we illustrate the transdisciplinary approach our group has adopted in the service of uniting the research on brain and behavior in the context of development. We specifically report on our nonhuman primate and human studies that collectively illustrate our “genes to behavior” approach to the study of development. Our goal in summarizing our research in this fashion is to promote discussion about promising templates for how research on brain, behavior, and development might proceed into the 21st century.

Extended maternal separations before age 5 were evaluated as a predictor of long-term risk for offspring borderline personality disorder (BPD) symptoms in longitudinal data from a large random community sample. Early separations from mother predicted elevations in BPD symptoms assessed repeatedly from early adolescence to middle adulthood. Early separations also predicted a slower than normal rate of decline in symptoms with age. Other theoretically grounded risks were examined and shown to predict elevated BPD symptoms over the developmental trajectory. Long-term effects of early separations were largely independent of childhood temperament, child abuse, maternal problems, and parenting risks. These data provide the first prospectively collected data on the developmental course of BPD symptoms and suggest a series of environmental and other influences on these very disabling problems.

Family systems theory has been highly influential in the study of recurrent psychiatric disorders. This review examines two interrelated domains: research on expressed emotion (EE) attitudes among relatives (criticism, hostility, or emotionally overinvolvement) and relapses of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, and randomized trials of family intervention in these populations. The literature is discussed in terms of contemporary systems theory and concepts from developmental psychopathology research. Several conclusions are drawn: (a) levels of EE are correlated with caregivers' attributions regarding the controllability of patients' behaviors; (b) EE attitudes are associated with bidirectional, mutually influential cycles of interaction between relatives and patients; and (c) family psychoeducational therapy, when combined with pharmacotherapy, is associated with lower rates of relapse in schizophrenia and bipolar illness. Underlying disturbances in family systems may emerge in response to illness symptoms in a family member, but also have recursive effects on the developmental course of the illness once manifest. The nature and stability of these recursive effects will depend on dynamic processes in the patient, the relative, and their relationship. Future research should elucidate mediating and moderating variables in the pathways from EE to patients' outcomes, and the conditions under which family treatments bring about favorable outcomes of psychiatric disorder.Preparation of this article was supported by Grant MH62555 from the National Institute of Mental Health and a Distinguished Investigator Award from the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression. The author thanks Martha Tompson for her conceptual input.

In the decade since the first observationally based empirical studies of coparenting process in nuclear families made their mark, most investigations of early coparenting dynamics have examined whether and how such dynamics drive child development trajectories, rather than identifying factors that may contribute to the differential development of such dynamics in the first place. In this prospective study, we examined both individual-representational and dyadic-interpersonal predictors of early coparental process. Fifty married couples expecting their first child portrayed their expectations and concerns about family life after the baby's arrival, and took part in a set of problem-solving tasks used to help evaluate marital quality. Both mothers' and fathers' prebaby expectations about the future family, and prenatal marital quality, predicted observed coparenting cohesion at 3 months postpartum. Maternal– and marriage–coparenting trajectories differed as a function of infant characteristics, with pathways most pronounced when infants were rated high in negative reactivity. Results reveal how the prenatal environment can come to shape early coparenting process, and indicate that family models must take into account the role that child characteristics can play in altering prebirth–postpartum pathways.This study was supported by National Institute of Child Health and Development Grant RO1 HD42179. We thank the families who contributed their time and effort to the investigation and our colleagues Regina Kuersten–Hogan, Wendy DeCourcey, Julia Berkman, Valerie Haskell, Meaghan DiLallo, Nina Olsen, Amy Alberts, Oliver Hartman, Stefanie Giampa, Eleanor Chaffe, and Kate Fish for their assistance with various aspects of this project.

This study tested the hypothesis that preschool-aged children with significant externalizing behavior problems are more likely to have insecure attachment relationships than nonproblem peers, as measured by separation/ reunion behavior at the time of clinic referral. Fifty children (ages 3–6) and their mothers participated: 25 referred to a child psychiatry clinic for one of the DSM-III-R Disruptive Behavior Disorders, and 25 matched comparison children without behavior problems. Using two new attachment coding systems for children of this age, we found that 84% of the children in the clinic group were classified as insecure, whereas only 28% of the comparison group were so classified (p <.001). Clinic children were also found more frequently to protest their mother's departure and to search for her more often during the separation. The implications of these results for the validity of separation/reunion behavior as an index of attachment at this age are discussed, as well as the methodological and conceptual problems that complicate our study of the link between attachment and behavior disorder.

This article describes the Rochester Child Resilience Project (RCRP) and summarizes findings based on its initial year of operation. Among 4th-6th-grade urban children who had experienced significant life stress, convergent sources of evidence about current adjustment identified demographically matched samples of 37 stress-affected (SA) and 40 stress-resilient (SR) children. These two groups were compared on 11 test measures designed to expand the nomological definitional net for the concept of childhood resilience. Additionally, separate in-depth individual interviews were conducted with children and primary caregivers. Both test and interview responses significantly differentiated the groups in the predicted directions. Children's group status (SR vs. SA) was predictable on the basis of discriminant function analysis involving five test measures, blind ratings done both for the parent and child interviews, and hierarchical regression analyses reflecting major domains of the parent interview.

Emerging developmental perspectives suggest that adverse rearing environments promote neurocognitive adaptations that heighten impulsivity and increase vulnerability to risky behavior. Although studies document links between harsh rearing environments and impulsive behavior on substance use, the developmental hypothesis that impulsivity acts as mechanism linking adverse rearing environments to downstream substance use remains to be investigated. The present study investigated the role of impulsivity in linking child abuse and neglect with adult substance use using data from (a) a longitudinal sample of youth (Study 1, N = 9,421) and (b) a cross-sectional sample of adults (Study 2, N = 1,011). In Study 1, the links between child abuse and neglect and young adult smoking and marijuana use were mediated by increases in adolescent impulsivity. In Study 2, indirect links between child abuse and neglect and substance use were evidenced via delayed reward discounting and impulsivity traits. Among impulsivity subcomponents, robust indirect effects connecting childhood experiences to cigarette use emerged for negative urgency. Negative urgency, positive urgency, and sensation seeking mediated the effect of child abuse and neglect on cannabis and alcohol use. Results suggest that child abuse and neglect increases risk for substance use in part, due to effects on impulsivity. Individuals with adverse childhood experiences may benefit from substance use preventive intervention programs that target impulsive behaviors.

Bipolar disorder (BPD) has received increasing attention from public and professional sources. Although pharmacologic treatments are considered the sine qua non in the treatment of youth with BPD, psychosocial interventions are critical to assist the child and family cope with symptoms that carry with them significant morbidity and mortality. Treatments developed to date are few in number; all are psychoeducationally based, using cognitive–behavioral and family systems interventions within a biopsychosocial framework. This paper reviews possible mediators of outcome, including caregiver concordance, children's social skills, hopelessness, and family stress. The author has developed two family-based psychoeducational interventions for the treatment of youth with BPD: multifamily psychoeducation groups (MFPG) and individual family psychoeducation (IFP). These treatments are both described and the results from a previously published randomized clinical trial (RCT) of MFPG are summarized. Then, new findings from an RCT of IFP are presented, along with preliminary pilot data from an expanded version of IFP. The paper concludes with recommendations for future research.This paper was supported by grants to the author from the National Institute of Mental Health (R01-MH61512) and the Ohio Department of Mental Health (ODMH-743074 and 734030).

Recently, a series of studies demonstrated false belief understanding in young children through completely nonverbal measures. These studies have revealed that children younger than 3 years of age, who consistently fail the standard verbal false belief test, can anticipate others' actions based on their attributed false beliefs. The current study examined whether children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), who are known to have difficulties in the verbal false belief test, may also show such action anticipation in a nonverbal false belief test. We presented video stimuli of an actor watching an object being hidden in a box. The object was then displaced while the actor was looking away. We recorded children's eye movements and coded whether they spontaneously anticipated the actor's subsequent behavior, which could only have been predicted if they had attributed a false belief to her. Although typically developing children correctly anticipated the action, children with ASD failed to show such action anticipation. The results suggest that children with ASD have an impairment in false belief attribution, which is independent of their verbal ability.

This study examined distorted self- and peer perceptions in aggressive and nonaggressive boys at preadolescent and early adolescent age levels. Subjects completed semantic differential ratings of themselves and of their peer partners following two brief dyadic discussion tasks with competitive inductions and a game-playing task with a cooperative induction. Subjects also rated their expectations for self- and peer behavior prior to the two competitive interaction tasks. Research assistants later rated videotapes of the interactions. Aggressive boys had more distorted perceptions of dyadic behavior as they overperceived aggression in their partners and underperceived their own aggressiveness. These distorted perceptions of aggression carried over for aggressive boys into the third interaction task with a cooperative induction, indicating these boys' difficulty in modulating these perceptions when the overt demand for conflict is no longer present in the situation. Results also indicated that aggressive boys' perceptions of their own behavior after the first interaction task is substantially affected by their prior expectations, in comparison to nonaggressive boys who rely more on their actual behavior to form their perceptions.

It is well known that comorbidity is the rule, not the exception, for categorically defined psychiatric disorders, and this is also the case for internalizing disorders of depression and anxiety. This theoretical review paper addresses the ubiquity of comorbidity among internalizing disorders. Our central thesis is that progress in understanding this co-occurrence can be made by employing latent dimensional structural models that organize psychopathology as well as vulnerabilities and risk mechanisms and by connecting the multiple levels of risk and psychopathology outcomes together. Different vulnerabilities and risk mechanisms are hypothesized to predict different levels of the structural model of psychopathology. We review the present state of knowledge based on concurrent and developmental sequential comorbidity patterns among common discrete psychiatric disorders in youth, and then we advocate for the use of more recent bifactor dimensional models of psychopathology (e.g., p factor; Caspi et al., 2014) that can help to explain the co-occurrence among internalizing symptoms. In support of this relatively novel conceptual perspective, we review six exemplar vulnerabilities and risk mechanisms, including executive function, information processing biases, cognitive vulnerabilities, positive and negative affectivity aspects of temperament, and autonomic dysregulation, along with the developmental occurrence of stressors in different domains, to show how these vulnerabilities can predict the general latent psychopathology factor, a unique latent internalizing dimension, as well as specific symptom syndrome manifestations.

This paper describes a conceptual approach to understanding the impact of marital violence on preschoolers, examines the predictors and mediators of child behavioral problems in a clinical sample of multiethnic preschoolers who witnessed their mothers' battering by their father figure, and presents empirical evidence supporting the use of relationship-based therapeutic modalities in treating preschoolers exposed to violence. We find that exposure to violence and maternal life stress are each predictive of child behavior problems, and that the impact of maternal life stress on child behavior problems is mediated by maternal psychopathology and the quality of the mother–child relationship.This research was funded by a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health (R21 MH 59661) and by grants from the Irving Harris Foundation and the Miriam and Peter Hass Fund. The authors thank the mothers and children who participated in the study and the assessors who conducted the interviews. We also thank Rachel Kimerling, PhD, and Chandra Ghosh Ippen, PhD, for their review of earlier versions of the manuscript.

Growing epidemiological, genetic, and clinical neurobiological evidence indicates that abnormalities in brain development play determining roles in the pathobiology of schizophrenia. Neuropathological research has made significant progress in delineating cellular and molecular abnormalities in schizophrenia that have relevance to neurodevelopment. This paper reviews the neurodevelopmental processes of neurogenesis, neuronal migration, differentiation, synaptogenesis, neuron and synaptic pruning, and myelination and the reported neuropathological findings in schizophrenia that may be a consequence of disturbances in these processes. While many neuropathological findings in schizophrenia are controversial or await confirmation, reported abnormalities in neuron density, number and morphology, cytoarchitecture, dendritic arbors and spines, synapse-related proteins, and the well-established absence of gliosis or any other evidence of neurodegeneration or neural injury all provide support for the neurodevelopmental model of schizophrenia.

At approximately 30, 42, and 54 months of age (N = 231), the relations among children's externalizing symptoms, intrusive maternal parenting, and children's effortful control (EC) were examined. Both intrusive parenting and low EC have been related to psychopathology, but children's externalizing problems and low EC might affect the quality of parenting and one another. Mothers’ intrusive behavior with their children was assessed with observations, children's EC was measured with mothers’ and caregivers’ reports, and children's externalizing symptoms were assessed with mothers’, fathers’, and caregivers’ reports. In a structural equation panel model, bidirectional relations between intrusive parenting and EC were found: EC at 30 and 42 months predicted low levels of intrusive parenting a year later, controlling for prior levels of parenting and vice versa. Moreover, high levels of children's externalizing problems at both 30 and 42 months negatively predicted EC a year later, controlling for prior levels of EC. Although externalizing problems positively predicted high EC over time, this appeared to be a suppression effect because these variables had a strong negative pattern in the zero-order correlations. Moreover, when controlling for the stability of intrusive parenting, EC, and externalizing (all exhibited significant stability across time) and the aforementioned cross-lagged predictive paths, EC and externalizing problems were still negatively related within the 54-month assessment. The findings are consistent with the view that children's externalizing behavior undermines their EC and contributes to intrusive mothering and that relations between intrusive parenting and EC are bidirectional across time. Thus, interventions that focus on modifying children's externalizing problems (as well as the quality of parenting) might affect the quality of parenting they receive and, hence, subsequent problems with adjustment.

This study examined the significance of childhood Big Five personality traits for competence and resilience in early adulthood. Resilience was defined in terms of adaptive success in age-salient developmental tasks despite significant adversity throughout childhood/adolescence. The Project Competence Longitudinal Study tracked 205 young people from childhood (around age 10) to emerging adulthood (EA, age 20) and young adulthood (YA, age 30; 90% retention). Multimethod composites were created for personality traits, adversity exposure, and adult outcomes of academic achievement, work, rule-abiding conduct, friendship, and romantic relationships. Regressions showed significant main effects of childhood personality predicting adult outcomes, controlling for adversity, with few interaction effects. In person-focused analyses, the resilient group in EA and YA (high competence, high adversity) showed higher childhood conscientiousness, agreeableness, and openness and lower neuroticism than the maladaptive group (low competence, high adversity). The competent (high competence, low adversity) and resilient groups showed similar childhood traits. Turnaround cases, who changed from the maladaptive group in EA to the resilient group in YA, exhibited higher childhood conscientiousness than persistently maladaptive peers. Findings suggest that children on pathways to success in adulthood, whether facing low or high adversity, have capacities for emotion regulation, empathy and connection, dedication to schoolwork, and mastery and exploration.

We present new empirical data and meta-analytic evidence for the association of childhood maltreatment with reduced hippocampal volume. In Study 1, we examined the effects of maltreatment experiences reported during the Adult Attachment Interview on hippocampal volume in female twin pairs. We found that reduced hippocampal volume was related to childhood maltreatment. In addition, individuals who reported having experienced maltreatment at older ages had larger reductions in hippocampal volume compared to individuals who reported maltreatment in early childhood. In Study 2, we present the results of a meta-analysis of 49 studies (including 2,720 participants) examining hippocampal volume in relation to experiences of child maltreatment, and test the moderating role of the timing of the maltreatment, the severity of maltreatment, and the time after exposure to maltreatment. The results of the meta-analysis confirmed that experiences of childhood maltreatment are associated with a reduction in hippocampal volume and that the effects of maltreatment are more pronounced when the maltreatment occurs in middle childhood compared to early childhood or adolescence.