Candice L. Odgers

Female and male antisocial trajectories: from childhood origins to adult outcomes

This article reports on the childhood origins and adult outcomes of female versus male antisocial behavior trajectories in the Dunedin longitudinal study. Four antisocial behavior trajectory groups were identified among females and males using general growth mixture modeling and included life-course persistent (LCP), adolescent-onset, childhood-limited, and low trajectory groups. During childhood, both LCP females and males were characterized by social, familial and neurodevelopmental risk factors, whereas those on the adolescent-onset pathway were not. At age 32, women and men on the LCP pathway were engaging in serious violence and experiencing significant mental health, physical health, and economic problems. Females and males on the adolescent-onset pathway were also experiencing difficulties at age 32, although to a lesser extent. Although more males than females followed the LCP trajectory, findings support similarities across gender with respect to developmental trajectories of antisocial behavior and their associated childhood origins and adult consequences. Implications for theory, research, and practice are discussed.

Group-Based Trajectory Modeling in Clinical Research

Group-based trajectory models are increasingly being applied in clinical research to map the developmental course of symptoms and assess heterogeneity in response to clinical interventions. In this review, we provide a nontechnical overview of group-based trajectory and growth mixture modeling alongside a sampling of how these models have been applied in clinical research. We discuss the challenges associated with the application of both types of group-based models and propose a set of preliminary guidelines for applied researchers to follow when reporting model results. Future directions in group-based modeling applications are discussed, including the use of trajectory models to facilitate causal inference when random assignment to treatment condition is not possible.

Research Review: DSM-V Conduct Disorder--Research Needs for an Evidence Base.

This article charts a strategic research course toward an empirical foundation for the diagnosis of conduct disorder in the forthcoming DSM-V. Since the DSM-IV appeared in 1994, an impressive amount of new information about conduct disorder has emerged. As a result of this new knowledge, reasonable rationales have been put forward for adding to the conduct disorder diagnostic protocol: a childhood-limited subtype, family psychiatric history, callous-unemotional traits, female-specific criteria, preschool-specific criteria, early substance use, and biomarkers from genetics, neuroimaging, and physiology research. This article reviews the evidence for these and other potential changes to the conduct disorder diagnosis. We report that although there is a great deal of exciting research into each of the topics, very little of it provides the precise sort of evidence base required to justify any alteration to the DSM-V. We outline specific research questions and study designs needed to build the lacking evidence base for or against proposed changes to DSM-V conduct disorder.

Etiological and clinical features of childhood psychotic symptoms: results from a birth cohort

CONTEXT It has been reported that childhood psychotic symptoms are common in the general population and may signal neurodevelopmental processes that lead to schizophrenia. However, it is not clear whether these symptoms are associated with the same extensive risk factors established for adult schizophrenia. OBJECTIVE To examine the construct validity of childrens self-reported psychotic symptoms by testing whether these symptoms share the risk factors and clinical features of adult schizophrenia. DESIGN Prospective, longitudinal cohort study of a nationally representative birth cohort in Great Britain. PARTICIPANTS A total of 2232 twelve-year-old children followed up since age 5 years (retention, 96%). Main Outcome Measure Childrens self-reported hallucinations and delusions. RESULTS Childrens psychotic symptoms are familial and heritable and are associated with social risk factors (eg, urbanicity); cognitive impairments at age 5; home-rearing risk factors (eg, maternal expressed emotion); behavioral, emotional, and educational problems at age 5; and comorbid conditions, including self-harm. CONCLUSIONS The results provide a comprehensive picture of the construct validity of childrens self-reported psychotic symptoms. For researchers, the findings indicate that children who have psychotic symptoms can be recruited for neuroscience research to determine the pathogenesis of schizophrenia. For clinicians, the findings indicate that psychotic symptoms in childhood are often a marker of an impaired developmental process and should be actively assessed.

The protective effects of neighborhood collective efficacy on British children growing up in deprivation: a developmental analysis.

This article reports on the influence of neighborhood-level deprivation and collective efficacy on childrens antisocial behavior between the ages of 5 and 10 years. Latent growth curve modeling was applied to characterize the developmental course of antisocial behavior among children in the E-Risk Longitudinal Twin Study, an epidemiological cohort of 2,232 children. Children in deprived versus affluent neighborhoods had higher levels of antisocial behavior at school entry (24.1 vs. 20.5, p < .001) and a slower rate of decline from involvement in antisocial behavior between the ages of 5 and 10 (-0.54 vs. -0.78, p < .01). Neighborhood collective efficacy was negatively associated with levels of antisocial behavior at school entry (r = -.10, p < .01) but only in deprived neighborhoods; this relationship held after controlling for neighborhood problems and family-level factors. Collective efficacy did not predict the rate of change in antisocial behavior between the ages of 5 and 10. Findings suggest that neighborhood collective efficacy may have a protective effect on children living in deprived contexts.

Aggressive and Antisocial Girls: Research Update and Challenges

There is a growing recognition that a significant number of young women engage in highly aggressive and antisocial behaviors. This acknowledgement has created demands on both policy and program development. The response to these demands, however, has been delayed due to the fact that we still know relatively little about aggressive and antisocial behavior in girls. In this article, we briefly review trends in the rates of aggressive and antisocial acts among female youth, address the issue of gender specific forms of aggression, and discuss research on the role of risk and protective factors. We emphasize the importance of understanding female aggression and antisocial behavior through a dynamic developmental framework that recognizes the cumulative and transactional impact of risk and protective factors over time. Our review focuses on adolescent girls in keeping with research that suggests that the risk for aggressive and antisocial behavior in girls is most acute during this developmental period.

Systematic social observation of children’s neighborhoods using Google Street View: a reliable and cost‐effective method

BACKGROUND Children growing up in poor versus affluent neighborhoods are more likely to spend time in prison, develop health problems and die at an early age. The question of how neighborhood conditions influence our behavior and health has attracted the attention of public health officials and scholars for generations. Online tools are now providing new opportunities to measure neighborhood features and may provide a cost effective way to advance our understanding of neighborhood effects on child health. METHOD A virtual systematic social observation (SSO) study was conducted to test whether Google Street View could be used to reliably capture the neighborhood conditions of families participating in the Environmental-Risk (E-Risk) Longitudinal Twin Study. Multiple raters coded a subsample of 120 neighborhoods and convergent and discriminant validity was evaluated on the full sample of over 1,000 neighborhoods by linking virtual SSO measures to: (a) consumer based geo-demographic classifications of deprivation and health, (b) local resident surveys of disorder and safety, and (c) parent and teacher assessments of childrens antisocial behavior, prosocial behavior, and body mass index. RESULTS High levels of observed agreement were documented for signs of physical disorder, physical decay, dangerousness and street safety. Inter-rater agreement estimates fell within the moderate to substantial range for all of the scales (ICCs ranged from .48 to .91). Negative neighborhood features, including SSO-rated disorder and decay and dangerousness corresponded with local resident reports, demonstrated a graded relationship with census-defined indices of socioeconomic status, and predicted higher levels of antisocial behavior among local children. In addition, positive neighborhood features, including SSO-rated street safety and the percentage of green space, were associated with higher prosocial behavior and healthy weight status among children. CONCLUSIONS Our results support the use of Google Street View as a reliable and cost effective tool for measuring both negative and positive features of local neighborhoods.

From Correlates to Causes: Can Quasi-Experimental Studies and Statistical Innovations Bring Us Closer to Identifying the Causes of Antisocial Behavior?

Longitudinal, epidemiological studies have identified robust risk factors for youth antisocial behavior, including harsh and coercive discipline, maltreatment, smoking during pregnancy, divorce, teen parenthood, peer deviance, parental psychopathology, and social disadvantage. Nevertheless, because this literature is largely based on observational studies, it remains unclear whether these risk factors have truly causal effects. Identifying causal risk factors for antisocial behavior would be informative for intervention efforts and for studies that test whether individuals are differentially susceptible to risk exposures. In this article, we identify the challenges to causal inference posed by observational studies and describe quasi-experimental methods and statistical innovations that may move researchers beyond discussions of risk factors to allow for stronger causal inference. We then review studies that used these methods, and we evaluate whether robust risk factors identified from observational studies are likely to play a causal role in the emergence and development of youth antisocial behavior. There is evidence of causal effects for most of the risk factors we review. However, these effects are typically smaller than those reported in observational studies, suggesting that familial confounding, social selection, and misidentification might also explain some of the association between risk exposures and antisocial behavior. For some risk factors (e.g., smoking during pregnancy, parent alcohol problems), the evidence is weak that they have environmentally mediated effects on youth antisocial behavior. We discuss the implications of these findings for intervention efforts to reduce antisocial behavior and for basic research on the etiology and course of antisocial behavior.

Supportive parenting mediates neighborhood socioeconomic disparities in children's antisocial behavior from ages 5 to 12

We report a graded relationship between neighborhood socioeconomic status (SES) and childrens antisocial behavior that (a) can be observed at school entry, (b) widens across childhood, (c) remains after controlling for family-level SES and risk, and (d) is completely mediated by maternal warmth and parental monitoring (defined throughout as supportive parenting). The children were participants in the Environmental Risk Longitudinal Twin Study (N = 2,232), which prospectively tracked the development of children and their neighborhoods across childhood. Direct and independent effects of neighborhood-level SES on childrens antisocial behavior were observed as early as age 5, and the gap between children living in deprived versus more affluent neighborhoods widened as children approached adolescence. By age 12, the effect of neighborhood SES on childrens antisocial behavior was as large as the effect observed for our most robust predictor of antisocial behavior: sex (Cohen d = 0.51 when comparing children growing up in deprived vs. more affluent neighborhoods in comparison to Cohen d = 0.53 when comparing antisocial behavior among boys vs. girls). However, these relatively large differences in childrens levels and rate of change in antisocial behavior across deprived versus more affluent neighborhoods were completely mediated by supportive parenting practices. The implications of our findings for studying and reducing socioeconomic disparities in antisocial behavior among children are discussed.

Substance use and community violence: a test of the relation at the daily level.

Prior research has consistently demonstrated an association between substance use and involvement in violence among individuals with mental illness. Yet little is known about the temporal quality of this relationship, largely because longitudinal data required to address this issue are not readily available. This study examined the relationship between substance use (alcohol, marijuana, and other drug use) and violence at the daily level within a sample of mentally ill individuals at high risk for frequent involvement in violence (N = 132). Results support the serial nature of substance use and violence, with an increased likelihood of violence on days following the use of alcohol or multiple drugs, but not the inverse relationship. Implications for the utility of substance use as a risk marker for the assessment of future violence are discussed.