Jack Block

Adolescent drug use and psychological health: A longitudinal inquiry.

The relation between psychological characteristics and drug use was investigated in subjects studied longitudinally, from preschool through age 18. Adolescents who had engaged in some drug experimentation (primarily with marijuana) were the best-adjusted in the sample. Adolescents who used drugs frequently were maladjusted, showing a distinct personality syndrome marked by interpersonal alienation, poor impulse control, and manifest emotional distress. Adolescents who, by age 18, had never experimented with any drug were relatively anxious, emotionally constricted, and lacking in social skills. Psychological differences between frequent drug users, experimenters, and abstainers could be traced to the earliest years of childhood and related to the quality of parenting received. The findings indicate that (a) problem drug use is a symptom, not a cause, of personal and social maladjustment, and (b) the meaning of drug use can be understood only in the context of an individuals personality structure and developmental history. It is suggested that current efforts at drug prevention are misguided to the extent that they focus on symptoms, rather than on the psychological syndrome underlying drug abuse.

Overly positive self-evaluations and personality: negative implications for mental health.

The relation between overly positive self-evaluations and psychological adjustment was examined. Three studies, two based on longitudinal data and another on laboratory data, contrasted self-descriptions of personality with observer ratings (trained examiners or friends) to index self-enhancement. In the longitudinal studies, self-enhancement was associated with poor social skills and psychological maladjustment 5 years before and 5 years after the assessment of self-enhancement. In the laboratory study, individuals who exhibited a tendency to self-enhance displayed behaviors, independently judged, that seemed detrimental to positive social interaction. These results indicate there are negative short-term and long-term consequences for individuals who self-enhance and, contrary to some prior formulations, imply that accurate appraisals of self and of the social environment may be essential elements of mental health.

Do Positive Illusions Foster Mental Health? An Examination of the Taylor and Brown Formulation

The proposition recently offered by S. E. Taylor and J. D. Brown (1988) that positive illusions foster mental health has garnered considerable attention and acceptance. However, the significant theoretical and applied implications of their view for mental health require a critical evaluation of their argument. An examination of the logic and empirical evidence used to relate mental health to three key positive illusions--unrealistically positive views of the self, illusions of control, and unrealistic optimism--failed to substantiate Taylor and Browns thesis. Further survey of more recent studies on positive illusions and mental health also failed to lend support to the Taylor and Brown generalization. Close consideration of several assumptions underlying the formulation raises further questions regarding their thesis. The present article concludes that it remains unproven that positive illusions foster mental health.

Parental Agreement-Disagreement on Child-Rearing Orientations and Gender-Related Personality Correlates in Children.

BLOCK, JEANNE H.; BLOCK, JACK; and MomISON, ANDREA. Parental Agreement-Disagreement on Child-rearing Orientations and Gender-related Personality Correlates in Children. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1981, 52, 965-974. An objective index of degree of parental agreement was generated by comparing the independent responses of 83 parental dyads to a set of Q-sort items reflecting child-rearing values and orientations. This index was found to significantly predict subsequent continuation or termination of the marriage and to relate to independently described characteristics of the family home environment. Further, the index of parental agreement was significantly related to the quality of psychological functioning in boys and in girls over a 4-year age range, from age 3 to age 7. Reliable differences were found in the patterning among relationships for boys and girls wherein parental agreement was more implicative for the psychological functioning of boys than for girls and was related positively to the development of ego control in boys but was related negatively to the development of ego control in the sample of girls.

The Personality of Children Prior to Divorce: A Prospective Study.

In a longitudinal study, the personalities of children from intact families at ages 3, 4, and 7 were reliably assessed by independent sets of raters using Q-items reflecting important psychological characteristics of children. A number of these families subsequently experienced divorce. The behavior of boys was found, as early as 11 years prior to parental separation or formal dissolution of marriage, to be consistently affected by what can be presumed to be predivorce familial stress. The behavior of boys from subsequently divorcing families was characterized by undercontrol of impulse, aggression, and excessive energy prior to parental divorce. The behavior of girls from subsequently divorcing families was found to be notably less affected by the stresses in families prior to parental divorce. The prospective relations afforded by the longitudinal analyses suggest that the behavior of conflicting, inaccessible parents during the preseparation period may have serious consequences for personality development, especially for boys. Hence, some characteristics of children commonly seen to be a consequence of divorce may be present prior to marital dissolution.

Personality antecedents of depressive tendencies in 18-year-olds: a prospective study.

Antecedents of depressive tendencies at age 18 were longitudinally evaluated using data from nursery school through high school. Depression was measured by CES-D scores from which the contribution of self-reported anxiety was partialed. As early as age 7, boys who subsequently acknowledged dysthymia were aggressive, self-aggrandizing, and undercontrolled whereas girls with later depressive tendencies were intropunitive, oversocialized, and overcontrolling. Similar gender differences were observed in pre- and early adolescence. At age 14, dysthymic boys were more likely to use both marijuana and harder drugs whereas dysthymic girls showed no tendency to use marijuana but did show a marked tendency to experiment with hard drugs. These girls also displayed low self-esteem. Preschool IQ correlated positively with dysthymia in girls and negatively in boys. The psychodynamics of gender differences in depressive affect were discussed.

The Five-Factor Framing of Personality and Beyond: Some Ruminations

The five-factor conceptualization of personality has been presented as all-embracing in understanding personality and has even received authoritative recommendation for understanding early development. I raise various concerns regarding this popular model. More specifically, (a) the atheoretical nature of the five-factors, their cloudy measurement, and their inappropriateness for studying early childhood are discussed; (b) the method (and morass) of factor analysis as the exclusive paradigm for conceptualizing personality is questioned and the continuing nonconsensual understandings of the five-factors is noted; (c) various unrecognized but successful efforts to specify aspects of character not subsumed by the catholic five-factors are brought forward; and (d) transformational developments in regard to inventory assessment of personality are mentioned. I conclude by suggesting that repeatedly observed higher order factors hierarchically above the proclaimed five may promise deeper biological understanding of the origins and implications of these superfactors.

Venturing a 30-Year Longitudinal Study.

Longitudinal inquiry has long been recognized as a uniquely powerful method for seeking understanding of psychological development. A 30-year longitudinal venture is described--its theoretical motivation, methodological rationale, and details of implementation. Some of the novel and implicative findings the study has generated are briefly described. Common to all of the results is an absolute reliance on long-term, widely ranging, independent data. Although specific aspects of the study have appeared over the years, its intentions and scope are recounted only here. By and large, the organizing constructs of ego-control and ego-resiliency find impressive support in various empirical inquiries, here quickly described. Methodologically, a number of savvy research procedures useful and perhaps even necessary in longitudinal research are conveyed. The troublesome burdens but ever-alluring attractions of longitudinal inquiry are noted. A forthcoming Web site will contain the extensive 30-year longitudinal data bank together with explanatory information. Psychological investigators may find these imminently available data resources useful.

Ego development and individual differences in personality

The relation between individual differences in personality and differences in developmental maturity was studied by relating observations of personality by multiple, independent judges to level of ego development. The personality characteristics of longitudinally followed Ss (104 at age 14; 98 at age 23) were evaluated by the California Adult Q-Set (CAQ); ego level was evaluated by the Washington University Sentence Completion Test of Ego Development (SCT). A priori personality dimensions--consisting of CAQ items for which a common developmental pathway was expected--were constructed and related to the SCT: (a) Ego-resiliency and interpersonal integrity were associated with increasing ego development, (b) conformity was associated with the Conformist level and, unexpectedly, to the Conscientious level, (c) need regulation was associated with the Conscientious level, and (d) self-ease and expressiveness-playfulness were not associated with ego level.

Parental Functioning and the Home Environment in Families of Divorce: Prospective and Concurrent Analyses

Abstract Relationships between marital status and parental functioning were evaluated both prospectively (years before marriage dissolution) and concurrently (after marriage dissolution). Prospective analyses included only then-intact families and compared parents who subsequently were divorced with parents who subsequently did not divorce. The subset of intact families in which divorce eventually occurred was characterized by unsupportive parenting of children and interparental tension years before the formal dissolution of the marriage. Concurrent analyses compared intact and divorced families. Marital status was shown to he related to parental self-concepts. Mother-daughter and mother-son relations subsequent to divorce are described.