The validity of a developmentally based life-stress model of depression was evaluated in 88clinic-referred youngsters. The model focused on (a) the role of child–environmenttransactions, (b) the specificity of stress–psychopathology relations, and (c) theconsideration of both episodic and chronic stress. Semistructured diagnostic and life-stressinterviews were administered to youngsters and their parents. As predicted, in the total samplechild depression was associated with interpersonal episodic and chronic stress,whereas externalizing disorder was associated with noninterpersonal episodic andchronic stress. However, the pattern of results differed somewhat in boys and girls. Youngsterswith comorbid depression and externalizing disorder tended to experience the highest stresslevels. Support was obtained for a stress-generation model of depression, wherein childrenprecipitate stressful events and circumstances. In fact, stress that was in part dependent onchildren's contribution distinguished best among diagnostic groups, whereas independentstress had little discriminative power. Results suggest that life-stress research may benefit fromthe application of transactional models of developmental psychopathology, which consider howchildren participate in the construction of stressful environments.

In the coming years we can look forward to research that clarifies specific mechanisms thataccount for the interplay between genetic and environmental influences on psychologicaldevelopment. Certain misconceptions, arising from research traditions initiated by FrancisGalton on the one hand and G. Stanley Hall on the other, may now be set aside in the light ofnew evidence. Three important findings promise a new synthesis. First, while each of us is bornwith about 100,000 genes that, under ordinary circumstances, do not change, the expression ofthese genes on behavior is dynamic. Some genetic influences are expressed early in development,but others are manifest many years later. Second, genetic factors often account not only for someof the individual differences in the measures of adjustments we typically use to monitordevelopment but also for individual differences in environmental experiences that covary withthose measures of adjustment. Indeed, genetic factors have been found to account for a surprisingamount of covariance between measures of the social environment and of adjustment in youngchildren, adolescents, and adults. Third, the expression of genetic influences are very malleableand responsive to the social environment. These new findings are revealing specific mechanismsfor the interplay of genetic and social environmental factors in four domains. First, the socialenvironment may play both a necessary and specific role in the expression of particular geneticinfluences on a range of behaviors from depression to social responsibility. Second, anunderstanding of the interplay between the social environment and genetics may lead to a clearerdefinition of the phenotypic manifestations of particular genetic influences. Third, wewill—as a result of these studies—have a clearer fix on the timing of importantevents and their sequence in development. Fourth, this new genre of work promises to illuminemore completely mechanisms by which the social environment influences developmentindependent of genetic influence.

We hypothesized that hyperactivity defines the first stage and that antisocial problems definea second stage in a progression that leads eventually to early-onset delinquency. As expected, astructural equation model (SEM) showed that a latent construct for hyperactivity wassignificantly related to a latent construct for antisocial problems. We hypothesized that this pathreflected a shared mechanism, disrupted parental discipline. A second SEM showed that therelation between hyperactivity and antisocial behavior really reflected a shared disruption inparental discipline. A third SEM showed that having antisocial parents was uniquely correlatedwith antisocial children but not with hyperactivity. A fourth SEM showed that early-onsetdelinquency was predicted by a latent construct for antisocial child; but when this was partialedout, the contribution for hyperactivity was nonsignificant.

Social support can have significant stress-preventive and stress-buffering benefits for troubledindividuals in everyday circumstances. Consequently, it is not surprising that many therapeutic andpreventive programs enlist social support to address problems of child and familypsychopathology, especially in the context of “two-generation interventions” thatseek to improve child well-being by strengthening parental functioning and parent–childrelationships. Home visitation programs are the best known of these two-generation strategies andhave become the focus of state-level and national efforts to support families and prevent harm tochildren. The conclusions of basic research studies on social support converge significantly withthe findings of evaluation studies of the impact of home visitation programs to yield importantnew insights into the conditions in which formal social support is likely to be beneficial, orineffective, in improving child and family well-being. Both basic and applied research literaturesemphasize the importance of linking formal social support to informal social networks in extendedfamilies, neighborhoods, and communities, and attending to the complex reactions of therecipients of support and the needs of support providers. These studies are reviewed andevaluated to highlight the connections between social support, developmental psychopathology,and social policy.

This article summarizes the research on the developmental outcomes of postinstitutionalizedchildren and discusses the implications for social policy. Postinstitutionalized children often reachtheir adoptive families with varying degrees of physical growth retardation, cognitive delays, andsocioemotional problems. Many children demonstrate remarkable recovery following adoption.Unfortunately, some of the children continue to display significant problems that requireprofessional intervention. It appears that the children's recovery may be influenced by theirearly experiences with their birth family and in institutional care, and there is suggestive evidencethat postadoption experiences also play a role. These findings indicate that preadoption andpostadoption services may support the outcome of postinstitutionalized children.

The number of children was incorrect in the original article published in 1998. Theparagraphs (pp. 169 and 170) that contain the values are here reprinted. We regret the errors andany problems they may have caused.

Nongenetic factors have a major influence on psychopathology. Knowledge on specificpsychosocial risk and protective mechanisms is more limited because of inadequate attention tomeasurement issues, person effects on the environment, and the possibility of genetic mediation.Nevertheless, a range of research strategies may be used to provide rigorous tests of causalhypotheses; these have shown the importance of environmentally mediated risks. Challenges forthe future include greater use of such research strategies, improved measures of psychosocialrisks that can be applied to large samples, investigation of origins of risks, identification ofcauses of time trends in levels of psychopathology, delineation of psychosocial effects onlifetime liability, understanding of environmental effects on the organism, appreciation ofprocesses involved in developmental programming, and understanding of individual differencesin susceptibility.

The Relational Psychotherapy Mothers' Group (RPMG), a developmentally informed,supportive psychotherapy designed to serve heroin-addicted mothers with children up to 16 yearsof age, aims at addressing psychosocial vulnerabilities, and facilitating optimal parenting, amongat-risk mothers. We present preliminary evidence on the efficacy of RPMG as an “addon” treatment in comparison with standard methadone counseling alone. At the end of the24-week treatment period, mothers receiving RPMG plus standard methadone counselingdemonstrated lower levels of risk for child maltreatment, greater involvement with their children,and more positive psychosocial adjustment than women who received methadone counselingalone. Children of RPMG participants also reflected fewer problems in multiple areas. At 6months posttreatment, RPMG recipients continued to be at a relative advantage, although themagnitude of group differences was often attenuated. Notably, urinalyses indicated that RPMGmothers showed greater improvements in levels of opioid use over time than comparisonmothers.

This article provides a targeted review of the scientific literature on the effects of experienceon early brain and behavioral development and later outcome as it pertains to risk for some formsof child psychopathology. It is argued that ample evidence exists indicating that the prenatal andearly postnatal years likely represent a sensitive period with respect to the effects of stress on thedeveloping nervous system and behavioral outcome, and with respect to the long-term beneficialeffects of early interventions on brain and behavioral development for some genetically baseddisorders, such as phenylketonuria and autism. Moreover, evidence suggests that parental mentalhealth during the first years of life has a significant influence on early brain activity and behavior,and long-term behavioral outcome. It is concluded that, although prevention and earlyintervention efforts should not exclusively focus on the earliest years of development, such effortsshould begin during this period. By directing such efforts toward promoting optimal prenatal andinfant–toddler development, the long-term negative consequences of factors that have theirgreatest influences during early development and which set the stage for future development canbe minimized or avoided entirely. Several recommendations for public policy and future researchpertaining to the effects of early experience on child outcome are offered.

Psychoanalysis ushered in this century. Will its influence on developmental psychopathologyend in the next? The paper explores some critical obstacles in the way of psychodynamicresearch, including the fragmentation of psychoanalytic theory, the relative independence oftheory from its clinical and empirical base, the predominance of inductive scientific logic, thepolymorphous use of terms, the privacy of clinical data, the dominance of the reconstructioniststance, and the isolation of psychoanalysis from psychology and neurobiology. Notwithstandingthese limitations, core psychoanalytic precepts are not only consistent with some of the mostimportant advances of the last decade but may also be helpful in elaborating these newdiscoveries in the next century. Psychoanalysis is centered on the notion that complex,conflicting, unconscious representations of mental states constitute a key facet of normal andabnormal development. This notion retains its power, and deserves a prominent position amongthe major frames of reference to guide developmental science in the next century.

Conceptions of mental illness in children are bound by cultural and social conventions of whatconstitutes healthy and unhealthy development. To understand current conceptualizations ofdisorders in children, we review the history of these conceptualizations from three intertwinedperspectives: a sociopolitical history of American children and families, the history of the mentalhealth fields and scientific disciplines involved in diagnosing children, and the evolution ofchildren's role in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Wereview where the field has been in its conception of childhood mental illness throughout the pastcentury, where we believe it is now, and raise questions about the direction in which childdiagnosis may be headed as we enter the new millennium. We conclude with social policyrecommendations based on theory and research regarding mental disorders in children.

Child development involves both reactive and self-regulatory mechanisms that childrendevelop in conjunction with social norms. A half-century of research has uncovered aspects ofthe physical basis of attentional networks that produce regulation, and has given us someknowledge of how the social environment may alter them. In this paper, we discuss six forms ofdevelopmental plasticity related to aspects of attention. We then focus on effortful or executiveaspects of attention, reviewing research on temperamental individual differences and importantpathways to normal and pathological development. Pathologies of development may arise whenregulatory and reactive systems fail to reach the balance that allows for both self-expression andsocially acceptable behavior. It remains a challenge for our society during the next millennium toobtain the information necessary to design systems that allow a successful balance to be realizedby the largest possible number of children.

The focus of this article is on internalizing problems that are experienced by children andadolescents. We provide an historical perspective, selectively examine the current state ofknowledge, consider advances and gaps in what is known, and identify new research directions.Diagnosis, epidemiology, theory, and research first are considered separately for anxiety anddepressive disorders. These internalizing problems, however, whether clinical or subclinical,share many common features and show high comorbidity rates. We emphasize the importance ofsystematic analysis of comorbid anxiety and depression, including their comorbidity withexternalizing problems. This could lead to more valid classification of subtypes of internalizingproblems and further an understanding of the diverse conditions that constitute internalizeddistress. We highlight the need to study anxiety and depression within a developmentalpsychopathology framework, as well as to include both categorical and dimensional assessmentsof these problems in the same research designs. This will be essential for understanding thecomplex interplay of biological and environmental processes that contribute to the emergence,progression, and amelioration of internalizing problems over time.

An early onset of delinquency prior to age 13 years increases the risk of later serious, violent,and chronic offending by a factor of 2–3. Also child delinquents, compared to juvenileswho start offending at a later age, tend to have longer delinquent careers. This article summarizesthe report of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention's Study Group onVery Young Offenders, chaired by Rolf Loeber and David P. Farrington. The Study Group,consisting of 16 scholars and 23 coauthors, worked for 2 years on preparing a report, undertakingextensive secondary data analyses, and writing chapters in different speciality areas. The reportconsists of a state of the art review of the developmental background of child delinquents. Thereport also summarizes risk and protective factors in the individual, family, peer group, school,and neighborhood that affect that development. Lastly, the report renews relevant preventive andremedial interventions in the juvenile justice system, families, peer groups, schools, andneighborhoods, and makes a case for improvement in the integration of services for childdelinquents. Policy recommendations are presented to improve methods of dealing with childdelinquents by juvenile justice, child welfare, and mental health agencies.

In this article we address several issues regarding problem or antisocial behavior inadolescents. First, we discuss conceptualizations of adolescent problem behavior to answer thequestion “What do we think we know so far?” Then, we briefly characterizecurrent interventions designed to reduce these behaviors, and their relative success in doing so.Next, we examine earlier attempts to prevent and ameliorate problem behavior (including juveniledelinquency), situating them in the historical context of America from the turn of the century toWorld War II. Here, we attempt to answer the questions “How did we get to where weare?” and “How can we learn from the past?” Following this, we try toanswer the question “Where do we go from here?” and articulate some researchand policy implications relevant to developmental psychopathology that arise from theseconsiderations. We argue that problem behavior is viewed most productively in its double aspect,which John Hughlings Jackson called a “double symptom,” with the positive aspectof the symptom reflecting adolescents' attempts to satisfy their developmental needs.

The early emergence and developmental implications of externalizing behavior problems intoddlers and preschoolers are discussed with an emphasis on which young children are truly atrisk for continuing problems. The extant literature is reviewed with a focus on the stability ofearly externalizing behavior and the diverse pathways that young children, primarily boys, withearly-emerging problems may follow. Findings from a number of studies, both epidemiologicaland high risk, suggest that the small subgroup of boys with multiple risk factors that includeespecially high levels of early hyperactivity and aggression, and high levels of negative parentingand family stress, are most likely to evidence continuing problems at school entry.Sociodemographic and neighborhood influences are also discussed, as are implications for futureresearch and policy.

This article considers whether Asperger syndrome (AS) or high-functioning autism (HFA)necessarily leads to disability or whether AS/HFA simply leads to“difference.” It concludes that the term “difference” in relation toAS/HFA is a more neutral, value-free, and fairer description than terms such as“impairment,” “deficiency,” or “disability”; that theterm “disability” only applies to the lower functioning cases of autism; but that theterm “disability” may need to be retained for AS/HFA as long as the legalframework provides financial and other support only for individuals with a disability. Twomodels are summarized which attempt to define in what way individuals with AS/HFA are“different”: the central coherence model, and the folk psychology–folkphysics model. The challenge for research is to test the value of such models and to preciselycharacterize the differences in cognitive style.

Drug abuse research and theory has become much more sophisticated over the last 2 decades,and some of the advancements parallel concepts that are part of the developmentalpsychopathology approach. The application of the developmental psychopathology perspective torecent drug abuse research findings can provide a greater understanding of that information andpoint to important areas of future research. Among the drug abuse research areas discussed hereand viewed from this perspective are antecedent and co-occurring psychopathological conditionsand other problem behaviors; the diversity of the nature of, paths to, and processes and outcomesrelated to drug abuse; the role of intermediary influences; the interaction of individual andenvironmental predisposing and protective factors; the role of families and other social institutionsin intervention; and developmental stage characteristics. Directions for future research are alsodiscussed.

This article presents policy recommendations relating to two aspects of primary prevention inmental health: (a) preventing adverse negative outcomes and (b) building health and wellness fromthe start and maintaining it thereafter. Recommendations for reducing diverse negative outcomesand end states reflect interconnections and bidirectional influences among physical,social–interpersonal, cognitive–academic, and “mental health”outcomes.

This is a critical review of the literature related to the neurodevelopmental hypothesis ofschizophrenia which posits that the illness is related to abnormal brain development. The reviewfocuses on data deriving from clinical studies, and it is organized according to the life phase fromwhich the data were collected: conception and birth, infancy and childhood up to the onset of theillness, after illness onset, and postmortem. The neurodevelopmental hypothesis is supported byseveral pieces of evidence, including increased frequency of obstetric complications in patientswith schizophrenia; the presence of minor physical anomalies; the presence of neurological,cognitive, and behavioral dysfunction long before illness onset; a course and outcome of theillness itself that is incompatible in most cases with a degenerative illness; the stability of brainstructural measures over time; and the absence of postmortem evidence of neurodegeneration. Ahistorical perspective on how this research accumulated and a section addressing important areasof future investigation are also provided. We conclude that schizophrenia is certainly not adegenerative brain disorder, and that it is likely that a brain insult in utero or at birth plays a rolein its expression. Current evidence cannot completely exclude the role of environmentalvariables after birth. In addition, it is possible that other psychiatric disorders may also have aneurodevelopmental component.