Developmental Psychology

Historically, much of the progress made in youth mental health research can be classified as focusing on externalizing problems , characterized by disruptive behavior (e.g. aggression, defiance), or internalizing problems , characterized by intense negative affect (e.g. depression, anxiety). Until recently, however, less attention has been given to topics that lie somewhere in between these domains, topics that we collectively refer to as the affective side of disruptive behavior . Like the far side of the moon, the affective side of disruptive behavior captures facets of the phenomenon that may be less obvious or commonly overlooked, but are nonetheless critical to understand...

While treatment guidelines agree on the first-line interventions for the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), there is an ongoing debate between experts regarding the treatment of complex posttraumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD). As scientific research is slowly emerging, different treatment approaches are used in clinical practice This article aims to provide a set of treatment options for C-PTSD in adult survivors of repeated exposure to severe violence and abuse, both in childhood and later on in life...

There is no relationship more vital than the one a child shares with their primary caregivers early in development. Yet many children worldwide are raised in settings that lack the warmth, connection, and stimulation provided by a responsive primary caregiver. In this study, we used data from the Bucharest Early Intervention Project (BEIP), a longitudinal study of institutionally-reared and family-reared children, to test how caregiving quality during infancy is associated with average EEG power over the first 3...

Peer cybervictimization and cyberaggression are educational and social concerns which have been extensively studied during adolescence but there is less research conducted specifically across all stages of adolescence (early, middle, late, and emerging adulthood). The objective was to analyse the prevalence of cybervictimization and cyberaggression, the roles, and the associated behaviors, depending on the stages of adolescence. The sample was composed of 7295 non-university Spanish adolescents, between 11 and 22 years old from 47 schools...

This study examined the psychogenic stress (PS) effects on changes in oxidative stress and the antioxidant capacity of an organism at different growth stages. The experimental animals were male Wistar rats of five different ages from growth periods (GPs) to old age. The growth stages were randomly classified into control (C) and experimental (PS) groups. The PS was performed using restraint and water immersion once daily for 3 h for 4 weeks. Reactive oxygen metabolites (d-ROMs) and the biological antioxidant potential (BAP) were measured before and after the experiment...

Sex/gender differences in personality associated with gender stereotyped behavior are widely studied in psychology yet remain a subject of ongoing debate. Exposure to testosterone during developmental periods is considered to be a primary mediator of many sex/gender differences in behavior. Extensions of this research has led to both lay beliefs and initial research about individual differences in basal testosterone in adulthood relating to "masculine" personality. In this study, we explored the relationships between testosterone, gender identity, and gender stereotyped personality attributes in a sample of over 400 university students (65 % female assigned at birth)...

The meaning in life (MIL) in adolescence is crucial in the developmental process of life. Anchored in the Integrated Model of Meaning Making and the Dual-Systems Model of Meaning, the present study aimed to explore the MIL profiles among Chinese rural adolescents and their characteristics, as well as the role of depression, well-being, character strengths, and academic encouragement in differentiating the MIL profiles. A sample of 579 adolescents from rural China (Mean age = 15.33, SD = 1.69, aged from 12 to 19, female = 56...

BACKGROUND: Cancer is a life-threatening, stressful event, particularly for young adults due to delays and disruptions in their developmental transitions. Cancer treatment can also cause adverse long-term effects, chronic conditions, psychological issues, and decreased quality of life (QoL) among young adults. Despite numerous health benefits of health behaviors (eg, physical activity, healthy eating, no smoking, no alcohol use, and quality sleep), young adult cancer survivors report poor health behavior profiles...

Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) is a term addressed to describe negative, psychopathological feelings, thinking and behaviours, including hostility and fear, exhibited by children who have been alienated from one parent by the other parent. Despite its relevance in the clinical psychology field, theoretical and empirical contributions to understanding and deepening the many facets of this concept are still few. In particular, literature aimed at disentangling the alienating parent's psychological characteristics is scarce and fragmented...

Attachment theory proposes that young children's experiences with their caregivers has a tremendous influence on how children navigate their social relationships. By the end of early childhood, intergroup contexts play an important role in their social life and children build strong ties to their ingroups. Although both domains relate to the same psychological processes-children's affective ties to others-surprisingly very little research has addressed how children's attachment relates to their intergroup attitudes and behavior...

INTRODUCTION: Theory of mind (ToM) refers to the ability to understand and attribute mental states to oneself and others. A ToM measure is warranted for preschool children to assess their ToM development from a multidimensional perspective (i.e., cognitive and affective dimensions). This study aimed to develop the Preschool Theory of Mind Assessment (ToMA-P) and to evaluate its construct validity and applicability. METHODS: The ToMA-P was developed based on comprehensive literature review and revised with expert panel feedback...

Machiavellianism is an antisocial interpersonal style involving the use of manipulative, deceptive, and coercive behaviors in the pursuit of self-interest. Although widely studied as a "dark" personality trait in adults, relatively little is known about the developmental correlates of Machiavellian tendencies earlier in life. The present study addressed this knowledge gap by examining associations between Machiavellian behavior and three theoretically relevant social-emotional domains-prosocial emotions, emotion recognition skills, and self-control-in a community sample of 7- and 11-year-old Canadian children ( N = 300, 50% female)...

Sibling relationships are most individuals' longest lasting relationships, but their development remains understudied. Using a within-family, accelerated longitudinal design with data from mothers, fathers, and two siblings from 201 predominately White, working-, and middle-class families, we charted the development of sibling intimacy and conflict from age 7 to age 30. We also examined structural characteristics (sibling sex, sex constellation, age spacing, birth order) and both person mean (between-person) and time-varying (within-person) links between (a) feminine-typed, expressive personality and (b) maternal and paternal warmth and conflict and sibling intimacy and conflict, respectively, and tested whether sibling age moderated these linkages...

Recently, several studies have suggested that metacognition emerges early in infancy and toddlerhood. However, to date, the developmental trajectory of these early metacognitive monitoring and control processes and their influence on children's later memory functioning remains poorly understood. The aim of this study was to longitudinally document the development of metacognition between the ages of 2.5 and 4.5 years and to examine the link between these early metacognitive skills and later memory performance...

There is a well-documented interdependency between destructive interparental conflict (IPC) and parenting difficulties (i.e., spillover effect), yet little is known about the mechanisms that "carry" spillover between IPC and parenting. Guided by a cascade model framework, the current study used a longitudinal, multimethod, multi-informant design to examine a process model of spillover that tested whether parental executive functioning (working memory, cognitive flexibility, inhibitory control) served as a mediator of the prospective associations between IPC and subsequent changes in parenting over a 2-year period...

Independent locomotion is associated with a range of positive developmental outcomes, but unlike cognitive, linguistic, and social skills, acquiring motor skills requires infants to generate their own input for learning. We tested factors that shape infants' spontaneous locomotion by observing forty 12- to 22-month-olds (19 girls, 21 boys) during free play. Infants were recruited from the New York City area, and caregivers reported that 25 infants were White, six were Asian, four were Black, and five had multiple races; four were Hispanic or Latino...

While there is considerable evidence that children's early ability to understand others' mental states, called "theory of mind," is shaped by family experiences, it remains unclear whether children's social interactions at school influence theory of mind (ToM) beyond early childhood. We tested whether the mean level ("quantity") and/or the diversity ("variety") of peers' ToM influenced children's own ToM. We also examined whether peer effects on ToM were independent of possible confounding variables (e.g., verbal ability, social isolation) and comparable across children with different initial levels of ToM and social status...

This study examined parental romantic attachment security as a mediator of prospective associations between hostile interparental conflict and parental discipline (i.e., power-assertive, permissive, and inductive discipline) for mothers and fathers of young children. Furthermore, this study utilized a novel, automatic assessment of romantic attachment security in examining whether romantic attachment assessed at controlled (i.e., self-reported) and automatic (i.e., a rapid word-sorting task) levels of representation differentially serve as spillover mechanisms...

Prominent theories of reading development have separately emphasized the relevance of children's skill in learning (Share, 2008) and lexical representations (Perfetti & Hart, 2002). Integrating these ideas, we examined whether skill in learning lexical representations is a mechanism that might explain children's reading development. To do so we conducted a longitudinal study, following 139 children from Grades 3 to 5. In Grade 3, children completed measures of word reading and reading comprehension and again at Grade 5...

Preschoolers who display extremely inhibited behavior are at risk for the development of anxiety disorders. However, behavioral inhibition (BI) is a multifaceted characteristic. Some children with BI are fearful when confronted by unfamiliar adults, peers, and objects; others are fearful when separated from their parents. In the present study, we examined specific features of BI that predicted observed friendship formation among preschoolers who are behaviorally inhibited. We also examined whether teacher ratings of classroom behaviors predicted friendship formation...